Perfection
by IceCamaro
Summary: So I made a wish to a dragon, to be sent to a time and place void of Vegeta. GokuxGokuxVegeta Not gonna lie, this story is pretty freakin' twisted from now on!
1. Chapter 1

Perfection by Camaro

Prologue

It began as a wish. Selfish, I know. A self centered absolution for problems that I was too cowardly to handle on my own. But my wish, all the same. So I stood before a great dragon and made a wish to not love him anymore.

That's what it'd become though, hadn't it? Love born from obsession and guilt. The anxious need for something I could never truly own; that all too pressing human nature that craves the one thing we can't have. Though I'm not human, I fell victim to this need. Not want, not covet, not yearn... Need.

So I needed him. So I thought about him. So I craved the days when we would fuck mindlessly, thoughtlessly... detached. How it started, I'll speak of it later. It's not for the telling right now.

But I must tell you this; bare me no ill-will those that will read this. I fell in love with someone that could never love me back. And when realization struck me in his most cruel form, I stared at the one thing that I thought I couldn't live without---and I wanted to live without it.

So as I said, I stood before a great dragon and I wished him away. I wished away every memory of him, his form cut off from existence, at least in my own reality. I wished to be taken to a world and time void of Vegeta. A nameless space that stood without his footprints upon it. A world of my own, free of my obsession with what I had no business wanting.

But something went wrong.

The wish wasn't specific enough.

And now, now I sit, writing in a journal, hidden away from this world I created, or more, set foot in. A world where he doesn't belong and neither do I. A world enslaved by a tyrant, the human species controlled and manipulated by a cold, violent being. Day by day they bow before the feet of an infinitely more powerful being, who would rather purge them from existence then walk around them. Dark, cruel eyes grace a land that isn't his own and he walks amongst bodies with the detachment of a serial killer.

So I stared into the eyes of the tyrant. And now everything I thought I knew about myself, I'm beginning to question entirely. Vegeta and I were once the yin and yang of the world, my goodness shining like a beacon over his jaded tendancies. But now he's gone and I find myself faced with the one person that scares me the most.

So I looked into the eyes of the tyrant. 

And he... is me. ---Goku


	2. Chapter 2

Perfection by Camaro

Chapter 2

Hot and Cold

I never thought I could hate.

And I never thought that the lines between love and hate could mesh into one thing that enjoys tearing a person down the middle. I used to pride myself on kindness and compassion and doing what was right. But time, as they say, can change things. And one day, I stood across from a monster.. and then I fell in love with him.

He was my outlet. He was my everything incarnate that I hated about myself. His rage boiled over and it felt like mine. His blood thirst was insatiable yet I could understand his lust for it. He was the rebel I would be if I didn't learn from his mistakes and shortcomings as a result of it. In short, I lived my Saiyan life vicariously through him. He became everything I loathed, yet I spared him. I needed him. Or so I thought.

He was beautiful. I guess there are better words to use but I don't intend to. Beauty was something that could sum him up though never quite do him justice. For all the ugliness that spawned inside Vegeta, his outward appearance could leave one staring in awe at their own demise. If he had been the last thing I ever saw, it was a good death indeed. I would have stood before a final blast and smiled if only I could catch a last glimpse of his infuriated eyes, baring down into me. He could strip away the clothing and flesh and muscle and tissue and leave me bare with but one glance.

And what's the worst part? He knew it.

He was a prince of beauty. His footsteps alone left traces to be worshipped behind him and I would cower after he'd gone, nursing my wounds and smelling his sweat over my heated skin. He would beat me and I would beat him, our secret song and dance that only slightly resembled the real war we constantly fought within ourselves when amongst each other. He could release some caged creation within me and then just as quickly, let the door close before it consumed my being. I became just like him at moments, furious and unable to see consequences for rage. And then, as if sensing my close descent from sanity, he would push my hold upon its threads, caging the demon and staring in victory over me.

Like he'd won a great war. One he'd fought and succeeded in every day.

As if he could taunt me, tease me and unleash the realization that he could truly make me into whatever he wanted. He made a monster out of a good man. And I think I still hate him for it.

I never accepted that I loved him. I think that was a part of me that I let lay dormant until it essentially became me. It had been there since the day of our meeting and continued to grow into what I liken to an egg-sack, filled to the brim with venomous spiders. And the day he kissed me? The spiders hatched.

I had stood against him, knuckles cracking as I clenched my fist, eyes baring back into his daringly. 'Do it,' I had thought. 'Hit me. Hurt me. Hate me.' And he had. Every fist against my face was a torrent of fiery ashes across my skin, breaking until blood busted across his lips, stretched into a dangerous smile. Red glimmered over his teeth, eyes alight with the volcanic hatred he poured over my body. And what sickened me most?

I liked it.

Ahhh but I let my head fall back in bliss as he covered me with his hatred, letting every wound speak the volumes he never bothered to voice.

Does that make me masochistic? That I craved his violence? That I relished every bruise he left over my pale skin? That I licked the places where his blood stained me?

Call me what you will. But don't judge me. I loved him. And I was blinded by that.

I would stare with disgust at my wife, at her irritating little quirks that I'd never even noticed, making me cringe at her touch. The facial expressions I'd once admired made me recoil in distaste, my body unwilling to give her what she wanted. She never could understand that. She never could accept that I couldn't force myself to indulge in the normalcies of human marriage. I was selfish, I see that now. Hell, I saw it then. But my own instinctual inclinations were pulled repeatedly away from her and I found myself barely stomaching the moments we spent together.

How could I have had sons with her? I would sometimes wonder, loathing my cruel detachment from her. I knew it wasn't fair. Yet I blamed him for it. He had awakened the Saiyan in me, the socially inept creature that craved only blood and victory---and him. 

Yet, in all my descriptions, I've given you a false idea of him. Yes, he's beautiful. Yes, he's cold. But please try to understand, I loved him for greater reasons than that.

He made me free. He made me realize that there had been bars when I'd never even expected it before. He showed me the world as no one could have seen it and he awakened every portion of my body that felt like it had never breathed. He was my God for a time. He breathed breath into my lungs and created me into something new and different. And for a while, that sufficed.

He would gaze in adoration for his creation, a perfect, frozen, warrior, intent to kill and purge just as I had been born to do. And then he would subtly remind me of what the cost of freedom was. And that's when I'd hear the doors of my cage slam once more, and the awakening would seem more of a curse than a blessing.

Like for two seconds, I was the abandoned dog, let out of the cage; and then just as quickly, pushed back in to suffer yet another year of confinement.

And then our affair began. I think it's easier for me to never mention our wives. It is. Because then I have to recall that in the endeavor for my freedom, I cost the love of many people. It's easier to always see him as the antagonist of the story; the essential bad guy. But as I see it now, we both hurt many people in our indulgence of selfishness.

He had stood in my kitchen, hips swaying slightly as he perched himself against the counter, elbows locked over it. A devilish grin spread over that immaculate face I could probably still paint for you, eyes alight with mischief as they always were.

"Good day Kakarot?" He'd whispered, his special name for me rolling off his tongue. His daily reminder that I was more than this. More than a petty husband and a weak human: A warrior by a nature I'd never known about.

"I've had better," I'd simply replied, always offset at his flirtateous, anxious behavior. I guess I'd preferred his fury, his unleashed animosity towards the warrior he knew was stronger in some ways than himself. His calm, calculating stare always unnerving me within my own skin.

The day in itself hadn't been exactly horrible, that's true. A beautiful spring had introduced itself to the former season, the grass and trees seeming to give a great sigh at the welcome change. In fact, it seemed as though the earth itself was awakening, gazing up at the fresh sunshine and shaking away the dripping icecycles that still clung to its branches. I had stared at the sky for what might have been an hour, breathing in cool air and closing my eyes when a warm breeze would wrap its way around my goose bumped arms.

Gohan, eight years old at the time, stood next to me, chattering on about things that, in his world, were the greatest contemplation of life yet seemed rather eccentric to me. Ideas of who he would be, his future job as an astronaut or fireman or all these terrific ideas that would probably never come true. It made me question whether I had ever explored the things that went through his mind or if, as I suspected, my concept of life in general would always pale in comparison to his own. His normalcy would forever isolate me as his father yet I had smiled down into his trustworthy eyes and knew that in that, I would find him fascinating.

So young yet still so far beyond what I had ever been at his age.

It was ChiChi's voice that grated into the calm contemplation of my thoughts, her stony figure standing behind us. An ever present look of disappointment and irritation was plastered over her plain features, her arms crossed as she took a breath.

"Staring off into space," She scolded, eyes rolled. "I should have expected as much. It'd be too much to ask for a husband that ONCE in a while actually does anything productive."

I was tempted to spit out a sarcastic "yes, because saving the world is such a tedious waste of time", but held my tongue as usual and smiled stupidly at her. She continued on, listing off the so-called "productive" things she'd already conquered that day, making all attempts to protect the universe seem as though child's play in comparison to dishes and laundry and God knows what else the woman did.

But I'm being unfair. I guess it's easier to look back and say she was a selfish, cold person. It is. She's my scapegoat, my personified justification for adultery. I don't write about all the good things she did, the calm moments when we would sit in our thoughtful silences and dwell over our life together. I don't write about how warm she was next to me in our bed, or the wild, sexual escapades we'd shared earlier on in our marriage.

She'd been the first person I'd ever had sex with. And while some people may say it's a shallow, pointless fact to bring up, I don't imagine I'd ever really been that close to ANYONE afterwards. She'd been my teacher in so many things. She showed me things about my body I'd never even considered before and she was, (again, I'm trying to refrain from male egoism) a constant "giver" in the bedroom. It was as though, sometimes, as much as she put of herself into house cleaning and up keep, she was just as enthused

in the sex department. She wanted to please me in ways I never knew someone COULD be so satisfied in.

So early on in our marriage, I would sit back and even wonder within myself WHY she had wanted so badly to marry me. With all of her generosity, I always felt like her expectations from me were quite limited. I was to be her husband, the father of her child and the hunter. And that was all she really expected at the time. Even in my simplistic nature, she found the qualities in me to constantly compliment my smallest efforts.

When things had changed? I don't really know. Maybe it was the inevitable coldness that eventually creeps into every marriage over time. And despite my first efforts to pour blame on her part, I was just as guilty. I wasn't used to becoming so bored with something. I always found something to occupy my time when I was away from her, looking forward to our reunion which was only that much sweeter through separation.

And then things became adrift.

The things that had once been just occupations for boredom, intermissions between our time together, began to grow into my happiest moments. It seemed that I no longer looked forward so much to her soft features that would greet me, my excitement more alight when my back was to her then when I was walking to meet her. At first I was certain that it was inevitability, my obsession with her simply fading. And then, to my horror, I realized that my obsession wasn't fading, but it was being replaced.

My most terrifying moment came when I had pumped inside her, having returned from Namek and taking full advantage of the sexual release we were indulging in. She had raked her long fingernails over my spine, whispering naughty, tantalizing scenarios through her lips, encouraging my wrathful efforts (which she knew I loved). I had filled her to the brim, her cozy, wet walls hugging my erection as I poured sweat over her heaving chest.

But through the vicious slapping of skin and heated breaths, I heard someone else's panting coming from her mouth.

And it wasn't female.

As I came, grinding out my orgasm through my teeth, I could hear laughter. And it wasn't hers. My face must have contorted strangely because she peered up at me, her bangs tangled with sweat, and asked me if something was wrong. And yeah... yeah, it was.

Cursing it as an odd reaction to our time spent apart, (not to mention the extremely odd circumstances I'd been faced with the previous months) I nearly forgot about it entirely, shrugging it off as I went on with my life. Yet, strangely enough, it followed me.

I would dive beneath surfaces of water, the bubbles and splashing drowned out by the sound of laughter in my ears. I would break the top of the water, my head darting in all directions as I searched for the source of such a disconcerting sound, finding nothing. It seemed as though there was almost an invisible being, following me around in my routine life, reminding me of its presence the second I'd forgotten about it.

But it was sex that was the worst, my mind utterly drenched in hot, panted breaths that weren't my wife's. Eventually, even the words she spoke, sick little fantasies and directions given in a male, accented voice. And certainly, it wasn't very long until I knew precisely whose voice it was. He was the one determining factor in my life that could pry apart the sides of me that were human and the ever present Saiyan instincts. And it seemed my humanity was losing the battle.

I began to wonder if perhaps his presence in my life had begun to effect my personality, unleashing my Saiyan nature and thus, when I was at my most primal, his voice would come to mind, encouraging me to be so. Sexually, I never really thought that there was much I was holding back when with ChiChi. Yet, with his encouraging whispers, I began to be more forceful with her, until I realized that in such, I could actually HURT my wife.

Times came when she would honestly tell me to go slower or to not be so rough, things I'd NEVER heard her say before. I think it must have even damaged her pride to have to ask it of me, considering she had always entertained the idea that in most ways, we were equals. Perhaps, now that I think on it, her animosity could have quite possibly spawned from the fact that we WEREN'T at all equal any longer. Time began to pry away at our similarities and the stronger I became, the less significant I think she felt. Perhaps, her constant belittling was a direct result of embitterment on her part.

She hated that I trained, because she couldn't do it with me. She hated that I could fly, because she couldn't. She despised my friends because she wasn't one of them and couldn't join us in our adventures. And the stronger her embitterment became, the more unbearable our time together was.

In Vegeta, I was fascinated. It was like I could watch him and learn so much about myself just doing it. He personified a lot of things about my nature that I had only suspected before. He was my confirmation about a lot of things I had wondered about myself growing up. He showed me through every movement he made how much stronger we were than them. His imploring eyes and flawless features were the present reminder that we were always going to be more beautiful than they were. His chiseled body spoke volumes of how our physiques differentiated from humans and the fact that we were created for fighting and indulging in violence.

The rough sounds of his voice and his accented words could soothe and ignite so much in me all at once. I could have listened to his stories about the past until there simply was no more future. He would sit beside me, probably perfectly aware of my growing attachment to him, and pour on about our heritage and pride and the future of our race if it hadn't been cut short.

He would tell me legends and stories he had heard as a child and the people he'd grown up amongst. Sad tales, comical adventures and horrific depictions of mass destruction he would admit to me, yet I hung on every word with unmasked idolism.

It's like he awoke some dormant part of my personality I'd never even knew existed. The side of me that let me smile just a little when he'd relay encounters in his past at which time he'd inacted the most cruel things. He shook awake the part of me that asked for more of his depictions of rape and genocide and purging, that seemed to insatiably yearn for more graphic tales of bloodshed. Though humans are bloodthirsty by nature, constantly seeking further ways to desensitize themselves, Saiyans are by far the worst in such aspects.

It was like every story he told fed this creature that crawled beneath my skin, unleashing the very Neanderthal part of me. I felt almost like a kid again, learning SO much that confirmed and solidified so much about my nature. His descriptions of our race calmed a lot of my questions about myself, justifying some of my natural differences from those around me.

There was a time when I could sit next to him and wonder just how I'd gotten so far in life without his guidance. And there was a time when I felt I couldn't possibly live a life without it.

Now as I stood in the kitchen of my home, ChiChi out in the living room with my son, I stared into the perfection that was his face and was reminded of that theory. What if I had never known who I was? What if Radditz had come and told me that I was different, yet I'd never had Vegeta to show me how... and who I was as a result of being different?

I thanked the Gods for him in that moment, regardless of how awkward our conversations sometimes could be.

"You need something," He grinned even wider, his eyes dangerously low as he leaned closer to me. I backed away, swallowing hard at his closeness. He never seemed to catch on to the social acceptancies of this planet, never really being aware of how his lack of personal space could make people uncomfortable. Or maybe, he was perfectly aware and just never gave a damn. Just another part of his unique being that made everyone completely mesmerized

with him.

"I... do?" I coughed, leaning further back as he approached.

"Ohhhh yes," he purred, seeming to sniff at my throat on both sides. "I can positively smell it all over you."

I flinched as he breathed me in, my shoulders tense as his piercing eyes bore into me.

"I can sense it over every inch of your body," He whispered. "You positively reek with it."

"Do I." I more or less stated, not wanting to encourage any more of his prying observations. "Well, I probably need a good soak then."

"My thoughts exactly," he laughed, loving that he'd unnerved me so much. One of the few victories he always had over me. "Let's blow this joint."

"I can't Vegeta," I nodded towards the living room. "Not now. It's almost dinner and it's getting dark outside. My wife wouldn't possibly..."

As if she'd been summoned, ChiChi walked into the room on-cue, gazing at the odd scene with slight surprise. Her eyes darted from Vegeta, who made no immediate efforts to put space between us, and my flustered face that could barely keep eye-contact with her. Vegeta just smiled at her, winking flirtateously.

"I'm borrowing him." He told her simply, inviting no disagreements.

"Ok." She said, blinking hard.

And just like that, he'd won over her usual argumentative nature, exciting me and dismaying me at the same time. I loved being with him, that's true. In fact, I loved being out of the house, even when the prospect of food was in the picture. But as I followed him through the darkening sky, moving closer to the edge of the world where the light was farthest away, I had a foreboding feeling of dread. Something major was about to happen and whether it was good or not, I was flying straight into it.

The smell of sulfur bit at my nostrils, the air becoming thick with condensation. We flew low to the ground, the stars now thick over the midnight blue sky. Fog came over my eyesight in huge whisps, until I realized we were flying over hot springs, the heat of the natural water clashing with the cold air. It became so utterly thick that I was flying blind, nearly colliding with enormous pine trees in my attempt to pursue him.

"Vegeta!" I called out, when the bottoms of his boots had disappeared entirely from my sight. "Vegeta, I can't see!"

I hurried onwards, despite the fact that I was flying now entirely blind, my eyes squinting as the warm, moist air drenched them.

"Vegeta!" I called again, blinking hard.

"I'm here!" He spat, scaring me senseless as I collided with him. His arms locked around me like two vises on either side of me, my elbows clenched against my sides as he tore us downwards. I cried out as we soared at breakneck speed, my stomach in my throat as he ripped us down towards the unknown.

Water and heat erupted volcanically around my body, my head under hot water as we broke the surface of a spring. A trillion bubbles flew before my eyes as I squinted through the dark water, making out his smiling face only inches from my own. He still embraced me painfully, his hair floating in tantalizing slowness before his cruel, laughing eyes.

I yanked out of his hold, gazing up before breaking the surface with a gasp.

"You might have warned me," I growled, when he followed me, water pouring down his face. "My clothes will never be dry by tomorrow."

His chest heaved in excitement, his sporty, tight black t-shirt clinging to his ripped pectorals.

"You said you needed a good soak," he grinned, moving his arms to keep him above water. I could feel the movements of his legs beneath, the warm water moving against me with every kick.

"Heh," I groaned. "I meant one without my clothes on preferably

."

It seemed as though I'd taken a big bare-butt leap into his trap, his eyes alighting as he smiled wide.

"That can be arranged."

"Cute," I spat smartly, rolling my eyes and trying to ignore the suggestiveness of damn near everything he said. He could catch my unease like a fly trap, chuckling darkly. "So now what do we do?"

"Easy," He licked his lips, moving closer to me than was AT ALL necessary. "Shhh... it's a secret."

I swallowed a ball of something that had formed in my throat, trying not to recoil as his face touched my cheek and he whispered in my ear.

"We..." He breathed sexually. "Soak."

With that he laughed at my expense, dragging me under with him as he swam through the lake of hot water. I rolled my eyes behind my lids, shrugging as I followed him, holding my breath and indulging in the natural warmth that the earth provided. I actually began to even enjoy myself, laughing heartily when we bashed into each other, or when we caught glimpses of the star streaked sky as we floated on our backs. The cold wind over the stretch of the water chilled our skin as we floated, side by side, the only sound that of our breathing and the gentle movements of our arms to keep us up.

"Vegeta," I breathed, moving my head just a bit to look at him. "Thanks."

"Hm," He laughed a little, looking back at the sky. "no problem."

It seemed the most perfect moment I could recall suddenly, just us two, in a void of space and time. Besides each other and the water, we couldn't even see glimpses of the shore or the trees that no doubt surrounded us. Tiny pieces of the sky through winds that caught the fog would peep down at us occasionally, but besides that, it was just us in all the world it seemed. And that, to me, was perfect.

"I've never brought any body else here," He admitted to me, breaking the silence but not the serenity. "It was just my special place for so long."

I nodded, though I knew he couldn't see it, wondering why he chose to change that; and why for me?

"I used to come here and catch those little pieces of the sky," He pointed as one appeared through the dim, white fog. "and wonder if I'd been to this planet or that."

An odd smile graced his face, odd enough for me to notice since I'd studied it profusely throughout the years.

"I used to wonder," he continued, "if maybe at some point, I'd looked at the stars from a different planet, and had somehow gazed on this one."

He shrugged.

"The things we know now," He mused. "I wonder if everything would have been so different if I knew then, what things I know now."

"What do you know now?" I asked him.

He looked over, mouth open slightly as he let a little grin form on it.

"A lot more than I knew then," he cracked, looking up again. "I used to think that next to Frieza, I was the strongest person in the whole universe. I used to think that once he was gone, I'd rule the same way he did. In fact, I went so far as to study every fucking technique the guy had. Enslaving people, conquering their strongest to humble their ideas of strength. Crush all hopes until in the minds of an infinitely weaker species, he WAS the only hope."

I watched the way his lips moved, magnified by what he spoke.

"And then you came along," he said in a deeper voice, his adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed, face suddenly serious. "And everything I 'knew'... wasn't true at all."

"What..." I paused. "What do you mean?"

"Frieza is gone," he said softly. "you saw to that. And again, I'm second best."

I looked away from him, gazing up through the fog and not seeing the sky any longer. I suddenly felt the tranquility of the moment melting away, a sort of unstoppable guilt lingering in my heart.

"And even now that all the universe COULD be mine," He said. "And even though it's obvious you have no desire to take his place, neither do I."

I felt my eyebrows contort at that admission, unexpected as it was

"I dreamed my entire life of one day being able to rule the universe," he mused. "And now, I guess I probably could. I could probably leave here, you'd probably never follow or try to stop me, and based on the idea that I'd never bother earth, I could rule in Frieza's place."

I thought about that, nodding when everything he'd said was reasoned to be completely true. No, I don't think I ever would have stopped him if that was his intent. Yet what he said next stopped me from voicing the obvious.

"But I don't want that." He breathed to the wind. "Hell, I don't know what I want. But I don't think it's what I always dreamed I wanted. I have spent so much of my life wanting something so blindly that now that its within my reach..." He shook his head. "It seems so utterly stupid and pointless."

We were silent for a while, both contemplating what had been said and the restored tranquility of the moment. He had brought me here, to his special place, to the place that he'd never shown anyone. What did that mean? How had things changed between us from the undoubtable rivalry and violence, to this moment in time when I was his confident of his childhood secrets?

"What will you do?" I asked, honestly wanting to know.

"I don't know." He said, laughing slightly. "For the first time in my life, I don't really have a path. First, I was the born Prince of everyone around me. That was my place, that was my path. Then, I was Frieza's little errand boy," a roughness around that statement caused me to cringe a bit. "who thought only of the day when that bastard finally got his and I was restored to royalty in the universe. But now?" He blinked. "It's the first time in my life when I'm not being told or ordered to be who I am. And..." he got quiet for a second, sorting his words. "I guess I don't know how to feel about it."

I wanted to reassure him, to console his troubled thoughts. But he was right. I'd never lived a life of servitude or slavery or even any sort of royal status. No one had ever really guided me or told me what to do or who to be. I had teachers and helpers but all by choice of companionship. I couldn't promise or guarantee him anything.

"I'm free," He whispered, as though he was just realizing it himself. "And it's something I've always dreamed of."

I looked at his face, at the gorgeous contours that made every angle of him desirable. I wanted so badly to touch him, a reaction I wasn't used to having with anyone. It worried me and I kept my fingers clenched into fists by my sides, unable to trust myself around him suddenly.

"And now that I have it," He continued on, oblivious to me. "It's almost the scariest feeling I've ever had."

"Well," I said after a moment. "You've always got me here."

I don't really know why I said it. It wasn't even appropriate for the topic, only a very quick reassurance that I knew I had to voice. Like I needed to remind him that in all the worries and uncertainties, he did have one constant. Like I was offering myself, my friendship and my trust up to him on a platter, no holds bared. He just smiled oddly at me, sitting up and floating with the water at his chin.

He moved closer to me, the water pooling over his mouth until only his dark, intimidating eyes were above it, both locked unmistakably upon mine. I dipped forwards as well, meeting his stare as he came closer towards my face, eyes locked as we were only now inches apart.

"Yes," he breathed, cool wind blowing his drenched hair. "And what an enigma you are."

I gulped, embarrassed to be so uneasy around him, unable to decipher his constant obsession for making me feel awkward at his behavior.

"Tell me," he whispered seductively. "what does the strongest man in the universe dream about at night? The man who seemingly desires nothing but peace, yet wages a war behind black eyes?"

"I...I don't know what you're asking," I admitted, shivering slightly at the icy air around my moist face.

He grinned in response, his fingers wrapping around my wrist and dipping my hand beneath the surface.

"This is how you make me feel," He breathed, watching my reaction and never taking his gaze off me.

"Hot..." He pulled my hand out of the water, letting the cold air of his breath and the wind chill the wet skin of my fingertips. "And cold. At the same time."

I felt blood drain from my face, my knees weak as the erotic-ness of the situation dawned on me. Against myself, I fought a war for something I didn't even realize could ever be a weakness, my whole body quivering with this intensity I couldn't even place. Like every reserve, every natural control I had over myself was suddenly questioned and I was wanting something I'd never NEVER considered before.

I suddenly wanted to be around him so badly that the mere thought of it made me blink in astonishment. Every facial expression was played out before his imploring eyes, my embarrassment forgotten as I tried desperately to simply control myself. I wanted him so blindly I felt like I needed to close my eyes just to purge the thoughts, knowing that even if I did, the whole process would be pointless. Like I'd been infected with insanity, I wanted sex so bad I thought I'd spontaneously orgasm right then and there.

The hotness of his wet hand wrapped around my wrist, when it dawned on me, I wanted it wrapped around something else. Hotness trickled beneath my pantline, my skin shivering around me. I felt almost betrayed by everything! My thoughts, my body, my mind... everything I had always fought to control was now controlling me.

"Vegeta," I stuttered. "Vegeta,... I..."

Without another word, he silenced my war, throwing in a treaty when his lips enclosed mine. I thought that in such a thing, I would have exploded, combusting right then in there. And I guess, in a really distinct way, I did. Like every nerve ending and tendon in my body was suddenly flickering with magic, I met his kiss with my own, taking his soft bottom lip into my mouth. All thought process was altered, from confusion and guilt, to something so much more. Something void of pettiness and consequences. Something more pure and more wonderful than any feeling I'd ever known.

My eyelids even flickered, my lashes batting as my pupils rolled into my head, the feeling of his silky tongue streaking over my top lip positively indescribable. It was the most sexual I'd ever felt; the most beautiful, the most magical, the most erotic I'd ever EVER experienced life. Like what heaven must be like or something.

Just the two of us, in a great void of everything else. Kissing passionately between the worlds of hot and cold, contained in a thick, white cloud.

He wrapped his arms around me, yanking me forcefully against him as we delved deeper into each other. I wanted to moan my happiness, to scream it, to cry it. It was like everything else just melted away. Every worry, every guilt, every sadness or loss or despair I'd ever had was suddenly so forgotten, it was like it'd never been there at all. Like I was being born or something. Everything was new and fresh and sparkled between my lashes.

I thought I could explode with a happiness I never even realized existed.

And then he'd pulled away, his gorgeous lips leaving mine for only a second as he whispered just a couple words, but precisely what I was feeling at the moment.

"Just me and you," He breathed against my mouth. "Just me and you."

Our lips joined once more, my eyes closing as I realized that that's the only thing I ever wanted. Ever ever again.


	3. Chapter 3

Laughter. Laughter.

I heard it, even as I picked up my pen and started writing in the ridiculous journal once more. Closed tightly behind thick doors and darkness, like some sort of dirty secret, my only lighting was a candle, as any sort of power source had long since burned out. I didn't want to tell the next stories, to up-to-date the readers of this diary. I didn't want all my desperation thrown down in ink, like somehow, by not writing it, it wouldn't be solidified truth.

But it was regardless.

Maybe I thought that if I didn't admit on paper that I was in love, somehow, that made it simple speculation. Like, a less carved-in-stone rumor or something.

Oh but God I was. I was so in love that I burned with it. Like somehow, it spite massive ovals of fire at any given moment, erupting into liquid flames that danced inside me. Like I had this constant fire pit within my stomach that never died, that was never extinguished with water. It never simmered, it never steamed.

It roared.

After the kiss, I was flying, soaring, diving, spinning. Every verb that could personify dizziness. All of a sudden, it was like my tranquil world of good/bad guy was stretched and then spun rapidly. Everything twirled around me and so rapidly that it caught fire.

While Vegeta had claimed that I made him hot and cold, after that night, I was hot. Constantly. I was like I could sit over a sink on a luke-warm day, and just have sweat pouring down my cheeks. It pooled at the crevice above my lips and beaded over my eyebrows. I thought about the kiss constantly.

Readers may at this point be thinking that I was suffering from very obvious guilt. That might be a half truth. I was guilty. But not because it happened or even that yeah, I liked it. But I was guilty, because I wanted MORE of it. It wasn't like medicine. It wasn't like something you took that made you cringe and then cured you later on. It was a pop-than-you-can't-stop thing. I craved it.

I obsessed about it every moment and every moment that I did, I wanted more of it. At first, I thought that maybe it was just how I felt that made me dwell on it so much. I guess maybe the idea of kissing another man had always brought the feeling of shame and even a bit of disgust. I kissed my wife because it was an intimate gesture that I held as above and beyond my affections for my sparring partners. A hug and a pat on the back was my physical adoration for my friends but a deep kiss was something held only for my wife. Because it had meaning and because it meant a lot more to her than something I could voice.

And just because it had been from Vegeta this time didn't really change any of that.

At first, I had thought that maybe, in his description of how I made HIM feel, he was trying to demonstrate what his words couldn't ever really inflict. Sure as shit, as soon as he kissed me, I was feeling the coldness of chaotic confusion and the heat of shame. But they didn't linger long, I'll admit that much. Then I realized, maybe he kissed me to voice something that words would never do justice.

As I had never been good with speaking or giving emphasis to what I felt in the moment, sometimes kissing ChiChi or making love to her was my only outlet for emotional chaos. Perhaps, the kiss hadn't been intimate or sexual at all. Maybe, it had been a very chaste, emotional understanding he was trying to impart on me.

And then, that theory took a nasty crack to the balls and fizzled to nothing.

It HAD been sexual! It HAD been emotional! And it had been both all at once.

So I thought about it until I was damn near purple in the face and blue everywhere else! Yes yes, chuckle awkwardly; 'everywhere else' entails precisely what you're thinking. I just wanted it so much more. I wanted MORE of those kisses that made my eyes flutter, that made my stomach sink and swim at the same time.

I thought for about .5 seconds that maybe I'd be perfectly content to just have one more. And once that theory was flushed down the shitter, I thought about .2 seconds, that maybe JUST kissing would suffice.

But yeah .5 and .2 seconds are a LOT shorter than you can even imagine!

I wanted HIM. I wanted to kiss him, I wanted to have sex with him, I wanted to explore and pillage and kiss and suck and fuck just about every portion OF him. Mentally, physically, emotionally, I needed him.

It was SO odd because it happened so quickly. Yeah, that's true. BUT... it doesn't make it any less real.

It was an over-night infatuational Big-Bang.

The day comes to me now, when yes, thoughts of him had run as rampant as ever, my mind, of course, chaotic with it. ChiChi had grabbed the phone, muttering out her half-assed greeting and her eyes widening slightly when she handed it to me, giving no explanation before crossing her arms and listening in.

Bulma's high-pitched voice sank into my ear from the other end, her words sprawled out so quickly that I strained to even make sense out of them.

"High-jacked... kidnapped...holding hostage... bomb.." Were about the only words that registered, my body straightening in alert.

"Where?" I said simply, nodding as she gave me a sputtered answer, my fingers flying to my forehead as I concentrated on the location. I glanced towards ChiChi, for not the first time, completely not caring what she thought and instead, looking away from her obvious disapproval. Honestly, what did she expect? 'No, I'm sorry Bulma, I can't save any hostages or punish any criminals. My wife would feel too inferior if I did that.'

I rolled my eyes at the idea, fazing out before hearing the last words Bulma spoke.

"Vegeta's already on his way."

Unexpectedly, my focus in the last moments had brought me directly to Vegeta, my mind subconsciously finding the source of his power and transmitting me directly to him. He stood shocked for a moment, his hair a blaze of silvery whiteness, his skin pale against the mass energy he was unfolding with his body. His youthful face was masked soon by a slight look of disappointment, his word "ascend" suddenly dawning on me.

He didn't want us to be recognized.

Before even taking in my surroundings, I let my energy rocket forward, my hair and eyes turning silvery white, the irises surrounding my pupil a very light shade of blue that only made the whiteness that much more piercing. I had seen the transformation before, gazing at myself in a mirror after having done so, staring in disbelief at the seeming-deity before my eyes. We were beautiful. But then, we were always beautiful. Only now, that beauty which could transcend any human being, was piercingly so. If anything--- I wanted to argue--- our ascended form could only bring that much more attention to us, as flawlessness was not comparative to humanity.

At close proximity, we looked nothing like them.

Dismissing this obvious problem, I gazed around us, our bodies only slightly shielded by the fact that the immense crowds gathered were paying no attention to my arrival. All eyes were glued to an enormous building, a hundred cop cars and black trucks with the word "Swat" written across them, gathered outside.

Loud voices behind speakers bruised my ears, my eyes squinting to see the reason for such upheaval. Vegeta, seeing my reaction, pointed towards a man, his forearm wrapped around the throat of what might have been a toddler. Squealing women, no doubt the mother and grandmother, were hauled backwards into the crowd by police officers, crying out for order they weren't about to get.

The man seemed less than fazed, perhaps a methamphetamine addict, red eyes glazed with something I can only describe as immense desperation and social detachment. Lined arms wrapped around the throat and face of the wincing child, the hoarse cries from the kidnapper setting my alert into over-drive.

Desperation was the quickest leap into insanity... and I'd heard voices like that before.

"Is this what we're here for?" I whispered, eyes lowered as Vegeta stood next to me. I couldn't help but glance over at him, his entire demeanor changed since the last time we'd been together. I felt, unwillingly, my hope for something more intimate flutter down, his face void of anything but professionalism. He was here to stop this and my presence hadn't changed the fact that this was a matter to be dealt with seriously.

"Not exactly," he said in a hard, accented voice. "There's a bomb."

I glanced up from my writing, closing my eyes as I smelt it. The sulfur and fire, the tangle of chemical fumes and smoke that tore upward around us. We had slaughtered them, one by one, as I came to the memory again in that moment, feeling flesh break beneath my hands. We had infiltrated the building, my clumsiness getting us spotted and unleashing hell on the building. Hearing the rain of gunshots from inside, the crowd had broken into hysteria, running to their cars and fleeing. Even the law enforcement agents were hightailing it, believing that the bomb would soon be unleashed.

Human nihilism being what it is, the mother and grandmother of the kidnapped boy were only too quick to forget their attachment, jumping into their cars just as quickly as any of the other bystanders. Blowing out the insides of the boys' head, the leader ran inside, meeting with the roughest end of Vegeta's fist. I had stared with fascination, watching as if in slow motion the monster's face wound around his knuckles, bending and breaking until it was just gory matter, his hand on the other side up to his elbow in the man's head.

"Slaughter them," He told me, seeing my hesitance. "Kill them all."

And we had.

Like angels of vengeance, we reeked monstrosities upon them, the kind no overdose could do justice. Like shadows, we crept from room to room, my heritage goading me to torture in ways it never had before. I admit, there were times in previous battles that I would prolong the pain, living off the pleasure I partook in it and indulging in the torment of someone who rightly deserved it. But not like this. Never like this.

Animalistic fascination overwhelmed any guilt and I saw the flash of cruelty in his eyes, reflecting my own. This was sex. This was our little secret, the ghosts from inside us awakened and tearing down upon the drug addicts. I grabbed a fleeing man by his long, greasy hair, feeling the strands come loose as I purged his face against a wall, loving the feeling of it pop, like a ripe, cherry tomato.

Vegeta laughed merrily over the sounds of gunshots, the light from blasts only flickering around his sadistic, bloodthirsty grin. He dove his fingers into a man's scalp, blood running into wide eyes as he peeled both sides apart.

I think even at the time, I realized my conscious would punish me for it later. It was completely contradictory to everything my heart told me. Every rabid instinct in me was alive and pumping, demanding the silence of my conscious in exchange for thoughtless cruelty. Vegeta had given me a gift in this; the beauty of bloodshed as it splashed around me. Everything was morbid artwork, to the stains of brain that shattered around a wall, to the eerie screams and moans of those we'd merely mortally wounded.

True, I'd always indulged in violence. It was an enormous part of my general nature. But I'd never loved it so much as I did in those moments we shared together. It was like the greatest gift he could have ever given to me and I realized that perhaps, that was his basic intention. He wanted to show me who I could be, what I was without the judgment of my home-world society. No one but us would ever know and despite the fact that they were human, I took no pity as even now, I spare very little on the victim's account.

Glancing over through the darkness and strobe-flickering of gunshots, I saw a red-rimmed set of fearful eyes staring at me. A shaking, quivering hunk of human life coward in the corner, his eyes glaring up at me as though he were meeting death itself; which he was. I walked towards him, my chest rising and falling with the luscious fear I could taste pouring from his skin. I could smell it seeping through his dirty pores, fluttering about his feverish body.

I crept closer, feeding off his fear, seeing something small and compact shaking in his sweaty fists.

"Kakarot!"

I woke up on the ground, fire pouring around my body. Vegeta's energy surrounded us, blocking off the worst of the flames as the bomb had gone off in my victim's hand. I flew to my feet, gathering my own power around my skin to keep the mass heat at bay. We were surrounded entirely by walls of flame, the blast taking out the entire building. The heat exploded around me, sweat pouring into my eyes as I met with his. Black reflected the flames, blood sprayed across his immaculate facial features as he smiled at me.

"You loved every minute of that, didn't you?" He whispered, his throaty accent paling the roar of flames. "My caged Kakarot."

I smiled at him, wanting suddenly to grab him up, to hold him and myself within the darkness we'd just unleashed. I couldn't feel bad about it. I couldn't regret it. Because he was absolutely right.

I'd loved it.

"Your heritage demands it," He breathed, seemingly able to read my mind. "Your love affair with cruelty."

His fingers suddenly reached towards me, wiping some of the sweat from my cheeks as I breathed hard.

"I wish I could set you free," He whispered, moving closer to me almost in a predatorial way. "forever."

His lips met mine and I thought that either that or the flames would melt me into the ground. The heat only increased as his tongue slid into my mouth, caressing my own as he led me closer to him. This is what I'd been waiting for, I wanted to scream. His fingers gathered in the back of my hair, yanking my face towards what must have been the ceiling, his teeth and tongue on my exposed throat.

"Take down your power," he told me. "Let this burn."

I closed my eyes, every part of me hurting with arrousal, letting my energy dive downwards as the heat from the flames began to burn me. Pain erupted, mixed with immense pleasure as he did the same, our teeth clenching as fire torched our wet skin. I screamed as his teeth tore into my neck, feeling boiling blood pool down my collar bone. Everything hurt, everything burned yet I wanted to cry in delirious sexual awakening. The pain was absolutely euphoric, kissing every inch of my body in ways that just plain pleasure never could.

I never knew I could be so primal and sadistic.

I pulled him hard against me, attacking his mouth as my fingers went beneath his tight shirt, feeling his smooth skin beneath my fingertips. I let the pads of my skin slide over the poreless flesh of his shoulder blades, grinning like a maniac as I forced my fingernails beneath the surface. Hot blood spat over my nails, his cry of agony causing my powerlevel to plummet even more, the fire making sweat on my skin simmer into steam. Electricity crackled around him as I wrenched my fingers downwards, still imbedded an inch into his skin.

We panted for cool air, finding none as we indulge in this flaggelancy, the inner sadist in both of us wide awake. But then, so was the inner masochist. We fed on the cruelty we endured and enacted, our eyes planted upon the other's to ensure that we were experiencing the same thing; the challenge to overcome the horror of pain and find the pleasure beneath monster.

I let my head fall back as we fell to what was left of the floor, his trembling body over mine. I could feel the mass of muscle that surrounded my gorey fingertips, the bones not far beneath. His steamy breath came over my ear, his words forming disgusting sentences that made me smile beneath him. Scenarios of what he'd always wanted to do with me, what debaucheries he wanted to enact with my body.

"I like it to hurt," He promised, goading me on as I dug my fingers deeper, loving the changes in his breathing. He pushed against me, the hardness in his body propelling mine to levels I'd never even experienced before. I'd never been so animalistic nor so nihilistic in my lifetime. And as I mentioned before, I loved every minute of this.

Every minute I spent being somebody else, or more, being MYself. Every minute that I didn't have to smile, or to laugh or to spit out sentence fragments to hide my true intelligence. I loved every minute that I didn't have to sound or act or look like a Saturday morning cartoon hero; every second that I got to act out the creations of a deranged, inhumane mind.

More importantly, I loved every second that I didn't have to behave like a human would; no longer the mannequin for a race that wasn't my own.

We indulged in nameless sex that night. I write 'nameless' because it wasn't sex. I wasn't something human minds could comprehend or words ever justify. It wasn't purposeless sex like animals have or passionate sweetness like human movies portray. It was something of our own. Something that can't be labeled or even described properly. It was pain and pleasure and that is all that I can rightly tell you.

Amongst the flames and ashes, we created something beautiful. Amongst the burning bodies and stench of death, we enacted something the planet had never known before.

And it was wonderful.

Afterwards, he lay over me, our bodies steaming, the hotness rising over our spent forms. We both trembled, our muscles unable to cope with the vast energy we had expended during our trist. Blood clotted over terrific wounds, mingling with sweat and spit.

And he'd whispered it. A thousand times he whispered it, like it was something he had to say, something that held more importance than anything that we'd done that day. Like if he'd held it back any longer, it would have imploded upon us.

"I love you," He'd panted against me. "I love you and I love you."


	4. Chapter 4

_"We have to tell them." _

I look up from my writing, the cold feeling spreading to my fingertips. I'm not sure, but losing the blood beneath your fingernails for no apparent reason doesn't strike me as healthy. Notches turn in my stomach and I breathe them out, leaning back into the chair. Why am I writing this? What good will it do? I hate all of it. I look back at the pages before this and hold a very express disdain for them.

My secrets.

My stupidity.

Written in every page before this. How could I fall in love? How! WHY!

How could I be so stupid that I solidified the cruel notion that people have always thought about me? I've always been stupid Goku. But it was easier that way. Human inclination is towards hatred and fear of what they can't understand. History itself has shown that human reaction is often to kill what it doesn't grasp, to hate that which is stronger than itself.

So I gave them weaknesses. I gave them a childlike mind behind the monstrous strength, and while they repeatedly chose to scold me for it, they loved it. They didn't fear me and I wasn't isolated from them.

Until Vegeta came, that is.

A month had gone by and please, realize that I didn't feel the guilt you all thought I would. It's so hard to write as a flawed being. I'm not used to it. I still want to play the perfect hero for you, with my one sin tearing me apart and my conscious eating me away for it. But it's not like that. I didn't care. All attachments to society, to my family, to my friends, they suddenly meant nothing to me.

I lived and I breathed Vegeta.

He would lay over me, speaking his thousand "I love you"s, as he always did, and I would gaze up at the sky over us, nodding my head silently. Yes, I loved him too. It wasn't even until the first night he'd spoken those words that I'd realized how much they rang true within me. I was so happy. A trillion writers and poets have lived and died to define love and yet, I can only think of one human word that can sum it up for me: Happiness.

I was happy all the time. Through fights with my wife, her shrieking voice could seem only like an annoying fly on the outside of a window, nothing more. Through days when my friends would maul me with endless questions of 'where had I been' or 'why did I never visit', I thought only that my time was spent on things greater than what their feeble human minds could fathom.

I was on top of the world and yes, that meant that they... were beneath me.

I had felt his lips over my shoulder, his kisses taking away the mist from the waterfall that beaded on my skin. He moved over me, his fingertips gliding along my smooth flesh, his teeth gently tasting every inch he could. We lay behind the waterfall, the sounds of nature heard only in the background of his selfless confessions. "I love you," He promised. "God, I just...you take me away from myself. I love you so much, I lose myself to it."

He moved over until he was facing me, his eyes devouring every bit of my face. I probably looked at him with idolism, my heart dancing within myself.

"At first," He spoke softly, eyes against the side of my neck as he nuzzled me. "I thought I just wanted to have you, to be with you. I thought it was so simple, that I could have sex with you and that would be that. But now I realize..." He choked back, more emotional now than I'd ever seen him. "Now I realize that without you, I'm nothing. This is the happiest I've ever been."

Perhaps it was the mist from the waterfall or something more, but my eyesight grew blurry and I pulled him to me, holding each other as though at any moment, we'd be torn apart forever.

"I love you too," I told him, biting my lip. "I really do."

I look up from this writing again, tempted to throw it against the wall and burn it all; watch the ashes form over lies and stupidity. I want to form my energy into a monstrous heap and pillage the pages from this world. But I can't. 'He' might sense me.

Instead, I bow my head and continue on.

I told my family. I told my family after not even an entire month of loving someone else, that I loved him more. I still see their faces, etched into my memory like ghosts from another lifetime. The pale pores and red rimmed eyes of my wife, her gawking mouth and sentence fragments.

"How?" She'd asked me a hundred times. "How?"

I'd knelt beside my son, trying to baby-talk the truth into a ten year old. Trying to justify myself when he knew the facts; that I was leaving, that I was going, for the millionth time. He didn't even cry. I thought he would, I thought he'd hang onto my pantleg and beg me to stay, the times in the past making this memory seem cold. He just stared at me and nodded. Stared into my eyes with nothing behind his own when he turned his back on ME and went back to his studies.

I don't...I don't even want to remember that.

I told my friends, one by one, the truth, the sentence Vegeta had given me to end all debates.

"We have to tell them. We have to tell them the truth and we have to tell everybody."

"Tell them... in these words if you can. Tell them that you love me. That you belong to me, that you are mine. And that despite what they may say, despite whatever comes, you love me now and you love me forever."

And I had. Anger, misunderstanding, hatred. They loomed from my supposed 'friends'. What had I been thinking? That I would be greeted with hugs and nods of approval? That my new preference somehow gave me a "get out of jail free" card when it came to my responsibilities? They hated me. They hated me as much as I loved him. It was fierce.

How many times had I saved ALL of their lives? How many times had I nearly died, (and had died) to protect this world that didn't truly accept me? Everything felt so trivial to me suddenly. That because I wasn't perfect anymore that I had become less to them. That my new found understanding dulled the sacrifices I'd repeatedly made in the past.

Long live friendship.

And then I had returned to him, crawling to his arms as I breathed out the hurt and rejection I felt. If this is supposedly what highschool life felt like everyday, I wanted suddenly to burn every one into the ground. No one cared, no one had listened. They all sat back in their flawed, sexually debauched lifestyles and judged mine. Because I wasn't the perfect hero I was less than a man.

"You told them?" He breathed, feeling hard as my arms were wrapped around him.

I nodded, wanting him to embrace me tight, as he always had. He stood firm.

"And you told them?

"Pre...," I looked into his eyes quizzically. "Precisely what you told me to say."

I touched his arm affectionately.

"I," I lowered my head. "I really wish you would have been there with me."

"No." He said in a dull voice. "It was better that way; for everyone involved."

My hand stammers as I write this. I can't help it. Fury makes me tremble.

This memory coincides with others that I have, the so-called "good times" now mixing with the flawed facts. There is no other way to write it, so I'll write it as I experienced it at the time; the words he spoke clashing with the memories I had of him--the sweet promises shattered to trash with the cruelties he reigned down over me.

"Vegeta," I looked into his eyes, seeing their dullness as though it had never been there before. "Vegeta, what's wrong?"

He just glared at me, his skin seeming like it was repulsed by every inch that I touched.

"Are you..." I blinked, pulling away from him. "Are you mad at me or something?"

He smiled suddenly, his eyebrows lowering dangerously and his lips parting to show his teeth. It was the cruelest smile I'd ever seen and I inched away from it, horrified by what it could imply.

"No, not mad," He said simply. "Entertained you could say."

I stared at him, trying to make sense of all this, trying to decipher what he was saying. I think now that I look upon it, my own inability to accept reality hindered the process.

"You are so stupid," He breathed, shoulders hitching as he chuckled. "You are so FUCKING stupid it amazes me."

_"I love you, I love you so much. At first I thought I just wanted to have you, to be with you. I thought it was so simple, that I could have sex with you and that would be that. But now I realize...Now I realize that without you, I'm nothing. This is the happiest I've ever been." _

"You've been defeated Kakarot," He smiled at me, everything about him resembling granite. "You've been beaten by a physically weaker opponant and now? I'm going to tell you precisely how, and why."

_"Love must set you free, because I didn't even realize that before this, I must have been caged or something." _

"You ruined everything for me Kakarot," He spoke quietly. "Everything. Can you even GRASP what that means? Can you even comprehend what I'm trying to tell you? Or does your attachment numb your ability to see the truth? That when I say 'everything', I mean that. I mean you ruined my entire life."

_"Sometimes, I just wish I knew how to stop. Other times, I don't. Sometimes, I think I'm in love with just being in love. Other times, I think it runs so much deeper than that." _

"I had a purpose! I had a path!" He screamed, fingers white as he dug them into his palms. "I HAD something before you. And you... you took that all away from me. I was a prince, I was a person; a something. I came back to life and I had an ultimate reason to breathe and then? Then you stole that from me. You killed the only reason I had for living and what's really fucked up? You didn't even grasp that. You didn't even FUCKING CARE!" The hatred in his eyes burned me. "You couldn't even understand or FATHOM that your so-called "great deed" for mankind destroyed people in the process."

He shook his head in anger, trying to suppress his rage.

"You know, maybe... just MAYBE if you had at least ACKNOWLEDGED the fact that you wronged me," he spat. "Maybe I would have been able to get over it. To see passed my own animosity and just live life. But I can't. You took that away from me too."

I could only stare, unable to believe the hatred I sensed from him. He positively radiated it.

"I thought I'd live in my anger forever," He sighed, looking upwards. "I thought that it would someday just consume me until I was imploded by it. You killed Frieza and I couldn't kill you, no matter how much my rage goaded me onward. You just wouldn't die. I thought that fact in itself would eventually desolate the remainder that was me, but it didn't; it just made me more innovative.

"I realized your weakness Kakarot," He smiled as though it would break his face. "Your love. You endless attachment to everyone around you.

"God," He breathed it like a sigh. "you're so simple. You just fall so easily. You love EVERYTHING around you! Every person, every being, every tree or rock or whatever! You attach yourself almost subconsciously to everything that surrounds your little, pathetic, pea-sized world. And I KNEW that I could feed off that!

"Yeah," He chuckled softly. "I could make you love me. I could make you fall. I just didn't predict how easy it could be done or how deeply it could run. You would throw away your own family because there was an emotional tie to me that made the connection with them pale. You threw away every friend you ever had, every family bond you'd created... for some pathetic lie you thought you had with me."

_"I never knew I could feel like this. Like I've never seen the sky before." _

"It was an easily calculated plan." He shrugged. "I watched enough human movies to know exactly what to say to you. I knew that your faulty childhood would make you vulnerable to their beliefs, to their social, verbal connection with intimacies. That if I even spoke the words, you would soon be brought to the belief that you were feeling them.

_"I feel like we're living in a lie though, I feel like sometimes, I'm going to burst with this feeling. Like I can't keep it down, like I want to tell the whole world about it." _

"You were only so quick to tell your own family that you'd fallen in love with me." His head was thrown back with laughter. "A man! Telling your entire FUCKING HUMAN family that over the span of a month, you fell in love with a man. A man showed you attention that opened up this pathetic notion that he wanted to be with you, and you," He shook his head, still laughing. "were damn near diving from the sky to tell them."

_"We have to tell them. We have to tell them the truth and we have to tell everybody." _

"You thought you loved me." He grinned. "You thought you loved me so much, you were only too willing to break your entire family's heart. To toss away YEARS of marriage and fatherhood. If I would have told you to, you would have probably jumped on a spaceship with me and flown off forever. And you know what's so sick? You probably would never have looked back. Yeah, in falling in love with me, you see now how fucking fickle your love for everyone else is. Who's the monster Kakarot? Me or you?"

_"Tell them... in these words if you can. Tell them that you love me. That you belong to me, that you are mine. And that despite what they may say, despite whatever comes, you love me now and you love me forever." _

"And now?" He became serious, eyes low. "now, sit in your despair for your failure, for your loss. Choke on it. Smother yourself with it. You cost me more than I anything I could ever do to you. But realize, everything you're feeling right now? Shock, disbelief, hatred, anger, rage? Yeah. I feel that EVERY day because of you. Sit among the ashes of your life and understand that you cannot even GRASP what I feel every single FUCKING day of my life. Sit in horror, knowing that you cannot EVER understand what you have cost me."

His body began to shake with his rage, his pupils expanding as the adrenaline rushed from his brain.

"I should be the strongest!" He screamed. "I should be the prince!"

He looked up, enraged.

"Instead, your physical strength is just a compensation for everything else the Gods must stare at and LAUGH!" He roared. "You're a loser! A nothingness! A fucking bathroom joke with the strength of a deity! And now?" He calmed himself. "Now I'm going to sit back while you choke on your own stupidity and I'm going to know that despite what I've cost you, despite the fact that you have the power to do it, you're not going to kill me. Because that's just another one of your many downfalls I've exploited."

He compassionately caressed the side of my face, his features marked with mock-pity.

"You love me and you're going to continue loving me. And what's more?" He smiled. "You're going to love and hate me at the same time. I've taught you the extremities of both and now? You belong to me.

_"I'm yours. Now and always. Come what may, I love you." _

"So say it Kakarot, Goku whatever stupid fucking name you choose to go by. Tell me the exact words you told them!"

He threw his head back once more, grabbing my face painfully and squeezing my cheeks. Tears were pinched by his bare hands as he mockingly tried to make me say the words he'd told me to recite: like a ventriloquist, trying to make me mouth the stupidities I'd relay to my family.

"Say it!" He ordered. "Say that you love me as you told them didn't you? That you belong to me, that you are mine. That despite what they may say and despite whatever comes, you love me now!"

He threw my face away painfully, bruises forming on my cheeks.

"And you fucking love me forever."


	5. Chapter 5

Rage. There aren't a lot of words to describe what I was feeling and even that one hardly does it justice; but if I were to put into human words the basis for how I felt, I'd say the closest comparison would be rage. As I told you before, I've never hated. I never have. It seemed like such a waste of emotion spent on useless plights for revenge and ideals of justice. Hate never had a part in my life.

It did then.

"Don't..." I swallowed, biting down the trembling feeling in my body. "Don't you feel... anything for me?"

"Well.." He answered a second later, cocking his head towards the side. "Now that you mention it..." He bent towards me. "I am kinda horny."

I don't even remember clearly what happened after that. Only that I was screaming sentence fragments that mostly consisted of the "F" word and beating him ruthlessly with the backs of my fists. There was no rhyme or reason to what I did. I think that's what really separates hate and fighting. You should never battle with hatred; it steals something from you. I felt no rush of adrenaline to spurn on my tactics or skills. In fact, I had no skills, or if I did, gave them no pressing thought. I just beat him. I beat him until it felt like I was hitting my fists into tenderized Christmas ham that splattered blood into my face and eyes.

I beat him until I couldn't see how beautiful he was anymore and then I kept beating him more. I could feel my teeth on the verge of breaking into my mouth but still I kept on. Shards of porcelain bone and teeth embedded themselves into my white knuckles, marring the base between my fingers. The vicious smack against flesh soon turned to splattering and the gore that drenched my hands reminded me distinctly of mashed red jello.

I had wrecked his beauty and I love that even now. True, I'm certain that the others came and probably healed him. True, I'm sure that his face now reveals nothing of what I did to it, courtesy of Dende and Sensu Beans. But I don't really think on that much. I'm just happy that for one moment in time, I wrecked something perfect. I made him feel as ugly and ruined as I felt on the inside.

Oh but he thought he was so fucking clever. That he would sit back and gaze at me through eyeless sockets, watching my ultimate downfall. Like I'd really give him the satisfaction of front-row seats to my heroic demise. Please. I may have been witness to his pathetic defeat by Frieza but he certainly wouldn't get to see mine. His cruelty didn't deserve that.

So I wrenched my hand back one more time, thrusting it forward into the cavity that roughly still resembled a nose. He was like roadkill, embedded into ground at least 6 inches from the surface, making all sorts of hissing, gurgling noses. I laid down beside him, smoothing my fingers over his chest as it trembled up and down, my rage leaving me. I breathed it out, my lips shaking.

"Vegeta, Vegeta," I breathed almost sadistically, moving my fingers over drenched, gory pieces of loose flesh. His only response was a bubbly stream of blood that shot out from the portion of his face that was once a mouth. I was sure at least one of his lungs had popped like a balloon during my assault. Hmm... maybe he wasn't so confident now that I'd leave him alive. Piece of shit.

I'd left him there to die and even now, head clear of that hatred, I still don't care. I don't. Hate me for it, shame me for it, I don't care. For all I know, he did die and I feel no guilt in that.

The way I see it, we killed each other.

'Doesn't take my heart to stop beating for me to die.

I looked around at the earth and I saw shadows of memories. I guess that's a very poetic way to word it but that's what I saw. I saw a world that consisted of what was and I couldn't live like that. I couldn't live perpetually in my "good ol' times" and there wasn't anything else now to live for.

So I ran away. I guess I want to say that I 'escaped' as that holds whatever flowery ideas of ego I still have but the truth is, I ran.

I still think it's odd that Bulma always kept the dragon balls together in one place, making it only that much easier for just anyone to make whatever wish they wanted at random. But I grabbed them, ignoring the shameful, hurtful spouts of 'how could you's' that rained down from Bulma and running out into the yard.

It was there that I gazed into the black sky and refused forever to accept the selfishness of what I was about to do. I cleared my conscious with justifications for selfishness and I even knew at the time I was doing it. But this world, this life? It wasn't mine anymore.

So as I said before, I wished to the great dragon to be sent to a time and a place where Vegeta never existed.

Only, the wish wasn't specific enough and as the earth, as I knew it, melted around me, I felt a horrid sense of foreboding that I'd just made the worst mistake of my life. Purples and blues flew at an alarming rate around me and it dawned on me suddenly that in all the wishes I'd ever made, I'd never asked to be sent to an alternate reality. I realized I was barralling through time and voids of space that could send me anywhere. I'd been reckless.

But again, I guess I didn't care.

Any world was better than a world of 'what if's'.

I tumbled to the ground only a second later, the dirt hard and cold as I planted myself face first into it. Frost and mud clotted on my chin and I breathed out a strange sigh. At least the earth still remained basically the same. There was an odd comfort in that menial bit of information and I closed my eyes, just breathing the air for a minute. It seemed... clearer or something. Less thick with pollution.

The sounds of scrapping and metal digging into earth was heard around me, and throaty gasps. I looked upwards, noticing that the sky was black and that there were many people within a few yards of me, torn between looking at the sky and staring at the odd man that had more or less popped into existence and planted himself in the ground.

Horrified gasps surrounded me as more sets of eyes glanced and then widened over me. Hissed whispers of "it's HIM" surrounded me and I crawled to my hands and knees, swallowing hard.

"Everyone..." A man stammered, his clothes consisting of the most basic fabrics. "E... Everyone get back to work!"

Probably at triple their pace, the crowd of over 100 workers furiously began digging into the hard ground, some of them trembling in fear of me. I guess I hadn't taken into consideration the fact that popping into existence from out of nowhere would shake people up so badly. But than again, something else told me it was more. I stood up, the people closest to me backing away, their eyes glued to the ground as sweat beaded on their foreheads.

"Um..." I swallowed, gazing at the man that had at least been brave enough to speak. He refused to look at me. "Ummm... can I ask... Where am I?"

He put his back into his work, still never making eyecontact with me.

"Southside quadrant of the eastern earth, sir." He speedily responded, shoulders shaking.

"Heh, you wanna try english there?" I joked, hoping to ease his posture a little. It was irritating that he wouldn't even look at me.

"Sir?"

I rolled my eyes, gently grabbing his shoulders and forcing him to look upwards.

"Look at me," I told him, uncomfortable when he seemed to almost melt into the ground. I was literally holding him in place, almost having to keep him standing. I'd never seen anyone look this afraid, least of all when dealing with me. "Look into my eyes."

"S-sir," He stammered, voice hitched up a level. "Sir, you don't like people making eyecontact with you."

"I don't what?" I squinted my eyes. This was just too weird.

I let him go, watching as he quite literally crumpled to the ground, his breathing leading me to believe he might soon hyperventilate. I had to speak with someone familiar; someone who was at ease around strangers. And as I figured it, watching the wide sets of eyes glued on me, this wasn't exactly the place.

Without hesitation, I took to the sky, hearing more hitched breaths behind me. Strange people.

The sky was lightening, though by the dark blue tint, I figured it was around 9 o'clock at night. Interesting that a group of people be working so late into the day but I shrugged it off. It wasn't exactly like those people were what you'd consider normal anyways. You would have thought I'd just grown a dangling set of steaming testicles on my chin or something!

The world beneath seemed different from the world I'd left behind. More forests remained untouched, or perhaps, regrown. The wind smelled more healthy, pollution seemingly non-existent. Buildings were but ancient, destroyed remnants of what they once were, apparently abandoned to regrowth and greenery. It was so odd. Cities that I knew existed and flourished still in my time were like ghost towns, everything shut off and no lights to be seen.

Had something happened here?

At this rate, I'd never find Capsule Corp, if it hadn't already been seemingly deserted anyways. I paused for a moment, reaching out with my energy to find a familiar one. A small smile reached my lips and I changed course, heading towards the small, flickering familiarity. I gazed upwards as I flew towards my destination, noting that the stars had never seemed so clear in my world, nor the taste of the wind so crisp and sweet. Certainly, something enormous had happened to this world and yet at the same time, it had to have been wonderful.

I flew over lakes and rivers that in my world, had dried up. I flew over places that I recalled in childhood, long gone and yet here, entirely untouched by anything but time. Trees that had long since been bulldozed in my world, thrived as though never having met human cruelties and new foliage and new growth was everywhere, as though a hundred humans had grazed over this area some years before and replanted everything.

I paused in my thinking, wondering what it was that compelled all those people to be out this late, apparently doing just that: planting trees. I shrugged it off. I had forever now to learn the secrets of this world. I paused again. No. Not 'this' world; MY world. My home.

I touched down outside what seemed like a hut or something, the walls made of caked mud and the roof wispy, long stems of grass. Candle light flickered from inside, the glass window (which somewhat surprised me) illuminated by the flickering flame. I gently pressed open the fragile door way, my eyes widening when the barrel of a gun stared down at me from inside.

"Don't. Fucking. Move."

I gazed through the pipe of the loaded weapon, hard eyes facing me from the other side. Panted breaths came from the corner and my eyes caught sight of Krillin, cowering against the corner of the hut, what appeared to be a child, wrapped protectively in his arms.

My eyes went back to my attacker, my lips whispering one word.

"Yamcha?"

"P-please!" I heard Krillin whimper, something in ALL my time with the man I'd NEVER heard him do. The sound entirely caught me off guard. "We worked our hours, check our time cards!"

"What's he talking about?" I wondered aloud, hearing the click of a gun loading a bullet. I stepped backwards slightly, moving slow.

"Back up." Yamcha spoke, voice low. Scars wrapped around his face, more than those of my timeline ever did. A deep gash went around his jugular, as though years ago, his throat had been slit fatally.

I looked at him with a less-than-impressed roll of my eyes, taking in the sight of his weapon. Ok ok. So it wasn't exactly un-intimidating, a large piece of equipment that quite literally wound its metal around his forearm, pointing directly at my head.

"Tell me Yamcha," I said confidently, pressing my chest towards his own, as though entirely unafraid of the automatic weapon. "And... answer me honestly. Just... exactly how LONG do you think this little trinket would stop me if my goal was to take care of you? Honestly now."

He looked at me, his eyes squinted and his mouth turned to one side as he considered the truth of my statement. Since when did Yamcha regard me with anything less this his poorly-hidden pity, his constant look that positively screamed "aww, poor dumb Goku"? Only now, I could sense only malice from him, a very deep seeded resentment towards me. It didn't make sense. Everything in my new world didn't make sense and I felt now that I was constantly at odds with the contradiction of the two places I'd inhabited.

I'd always loved the fact that I was accepted in my old world, no matter the tediousness of a constant facade of ignorance. I liked that my strength didn't isolate me from my friends, however much I now looked at our relationships as somewhat fickle.

I shook my head in dismay. I didn't like being confused. I didn't like having things around me unpredictable.

Rather than shaking off the rude greeting or even lowering the large weapon, he merely cocked it, preparing to unleash whatever hell it was capable of. I looked over towards Krillin, seeing the fear that he wore like an entire mask over his face. I'd never seen him cower. I think that's what I've always loved about him. His inability to accept helplessness no matter his limitations.

"Check our cards!" He screamed at me, watching my eyes for some sort of leniency or something. I just lowered my brows at him, trying to make sense of the senseless. "I promise you! Please, we've worked our hours today. Like every other day. Leave us in peace, I'm begging you!"

I just blinked in astonishment. What the hell was he talking about?

"You," Yamcha breathed out the word, trembling with anger. "You fucking soulless shit!"

I widened my eyes at that.

Yeah, this world was completely looney.

It was then that I glanced to the side, swallowing down bile in my throat that I didn't even realize had risen in there. No. I told myself I was crazy. I promised myself I was just as fucking nutty as every other person on this ridiculous puppet show of a universe. There was no way I was feeling what every other instinct in my body told me I was feeling.

I was crazy.

Please God, tell me I'm crazy.

I glanced to the side, my arms and legs feeling like I'd just lost all of the blood and sensory nerves in them.

Coldness dwelled in a great monstrous accord, half way across the earth. Power, dark power building at a furious, horrendous pace. Evil energy soaring.

"No," I whispered it aloud. "Vegeta."


	6. Chapter 6

I hadn't stopped to explain myself or even ask questions. I had taken to the sky, keeping my power level at its maximum lowest, hoping against hope he wouldn't sense me coming.

How?

I just kept repeating the word in my head, like somehow, it was going to change the inevitable fact that EVERYTHING had virtually gone wrong. Now, I realize that I could have been a BIT more specific in my dragon request and all but this was ridiculous. How! How the fuck could everything have gone so wrong? I wanted to wake up now.

I just soared at break neck speed towards the disturbance, the sky now completely dark save for the moon that stared down at me almost accusingly. It was like it was just scolding at me or something. "Oh, how cute.. look at you. You thought you had it all figured out."

I'd never felt so pathetically human in all my life. This is what it must feel like everyday, I mused. Confused, scared, helpless.

This just sucked.

The power level was awful. It wasn't the fact that it was strong, though, yeah, it was. It was the evil I felt positively radiating from it. Darkness. It was like being able to sense shadows when you walked around them. Only, this was a huge shadow that pooled and expanded throughout a corner of the earth. To be honest, it frightened me.

I touched down about a mile from where I sensed it, surprised that I'd made it here within two hours. My mind was so whirled and twisted with scenarios and ideas that I'd basically just shut it off for the time being. I couldn't dwell in confusion when I knew the answer was within walking distance and mulling over senseless scenarios never did me any good anyways.

So I just walked, ignoring the never-ending "how's" and "why's" and "huh's" that consistently poked at my subconscious. This wasn't getting me anywhere. I picked up my pace, crawling at some points through thick forest, vines snagging my clothes. Branches of trees dipped low, dragging their blades across my face as I winced my way onwards.

The power level was fluctuating, something that struck me as rather odd in its rapid, spontaneous spits of energy. It was close now, yet I sensed nothing within it that didn't scream evil. Even Vegeta wasn't this messed up. And that was a perfect phrase for it: "Messed up." Something about the power just wasn't natural in its placid depths. The constant rise and fall would have told me in earlier times that the user was unfamiliar with the process of controlling energy. My son had always made the same mistake, when honing his skills as a young boy. His power had always struck me as unsure, limited in his natural state and yet soaring beyond anything natural when he was provoked.

The power I felt now was... I couldn't say that it was ultimately unsure of itself so much as spurned by emotion. Like the rage in the user constantly threw the level upwards and then when sanity returned momentarily, came back down to normal.

So odd.

I could hear voices eventually, the sound of one overbearing tone telling me that was the culprit of the energy. My face twisted as a dangling branch got my arm, slicing deep into my skin as I kept my ki level so low. I was no more than human now, my inner Saiyan cringing at the idea. I didn't like being so weak or even being able to relate to this low level of power. Maybe I was a control freak after all!

I smirked a little at the idea, pitying myself for finding humor at a time like this. It was a poor compensation for the bewilderment I was suffering.

"Hey, you!" I cringed, turning towards the man that stared at me. I lowered my head, keeping my face concealed from him, afraid his reaction to me would be just as terrible as everyone else's had been.

"Where's your work uniform?" He spat, eyes wide as I stared meekly up at him, using the shadows to keep whatever features I could hidden. His face was contorted with disbelief, his plain, brown hair swaying in the slight breeze. "Are you crazy? Hasn't anyone told you? He's HERE!"

I just blinked at him.

"Do you know what will happen if he catches you not working? To all of us!" He shook his head, tossing a brownish-stained cloak at me. "Put it on! Hurry!"

Bewildered, I tossed it over my clothing, wrapping the hood around my face. This was like a bad Twilight Zone episode.

An idea came to me quickly, relief washing over my whole body. Very slowly, and controlling my energy as well as only I could, I felt my hair slowly transform, my eyes stinging slightly and feeling pressurized as they became pale blue. Silver white locks of hair fell over my eyes and I grinned, knowing that I'd be virtually unrecognizable now--however confused I was about the fact that up until now, I was apparently viewed as public-enemy number one.

Tossing a shovel into my hand, the man turned away, thankfully having been oblivious to the massive change of my features. I grinned to myself once more, proud of my quick thinking. Yes, Vegeta, in all his hateable qualities, had taught me something.

I moved slowly towards the voice and the source of the fluctuating energy level, keeping my own at what was normal for any human. The grass crinkled as I touched over it, the heat of my transformation wilting it. I held the cloak wrapped beneath my chin, the whiteness of my hair spilling over my haunting eyes. The transformation, as always, a blessing and curse.

While I'd be unrecognizable, I was still noticeably different at close range and so I dipped my head lower, keeping my eyes on the ground. Even in this light, they'd be shockingly bright, 'piercing' as Bulma had once informed me. Inhuman in the coldness they displayed. Sometimes, they could almost appear to be two dull burning flashlights, even through the dark, energized by the inferno of power behind them. So I held my lids low, more or less walking aimlessly towards what now sounded like a verbal sparring fest.

"This group is a day and a half behind the quoted schedule." A cruel voice spat, the tone hoarse and raspy. "What's the point of me making quotas if they're only going to be so blatantly ignored?"

I kept my head down, seeing only the feet of those in front of me. A small crowd had seemingly gathered around the source of vibrating power, still working furiously over the ground and planting seeds.

I saw a rather large tree, staying as incognito as possible as I maneuvered myself towards it. Feeling the bark beneath my fingertips, I moved behind, concealed now by branches and darkness. Gathering my strength, I chanced a glance upward, horrified that I would see precisely who I already knew it would be.

And then grasping onto the bow of the tree for simple strength when I realized, I was wrong.

I was so fucking wrong.

My whole body became a mesh of boneless, quivering flesh, every part of my brain screaming. I couldn't even coherently make out a word of what my brain WAS screaming, only knowing that it was. My fingertips felt bruised as I peeled them over strong bark, grabbing onto the tree to hold my body upwards.

There was just no way. I was dreaming. I was seeing things. I was going blind.

There was just no way that the man I was seeing, the source of such a dark force...

Looked exactly like me.

"You there!" He screamed, his voice sounding like a raspier version of mine as he pointed towards a white haired old man, standing towards the side. "Did I say you could stop working?"

I shook my head, watching as the man that looked precisely like me walked, with cat-like grace, towards the now shivering elderly man, the cup of water he'd recently taken from a barrel, falling to the ground.

"W-water, Sir," He mumbled almost inaudibly, his eyes low on the ground. "I just ... I just needed some water."

"We have scheduled water breaks for that," The clone of myself said coldly, crunching the cup with his foot. "Or are you special? Do the rules not apply to you?"

The old man shook his head fiercely, becoming visibly panicked.

"You're not special then?" The tyrant cocked his head to the side, standing a little too close towards the cowering human. "Then... prey tell." He blinked rapidly. "Just why-oh-why do you get a special water break?"

Before the man could answer, or even see the movement, he'd been planted into the ground, his chin digging into the cold soil. The tyrant placed a foot on the back of the old man's neck, staring with furious, penetrating eyes.

I took a second to just gaze at this unbelievable sight, the man who looked so much like myself just posing like a statue over the cowering man. Black, shinny combat boots glimmered in the moonlight, the pantleg of impressively tailored black, Teflon pants hanging over the thick laces. Jagged loops went up the pant legs, large knives tied around the thighs and hanging tightly to the sides. A tight black, wife-beater (as they're referred to last I heard) held snuggly to every ripped feature of his chest, a gun holster around his shoulders; two gold encrusted guns hanging on his lower back.

"Or is it because you're old?" He was spitting venomously. "And tired and weak and too aged to be of any use to this world?"

"N-no! No sir!" the man sobbed, waving his arms around in an odd fashion. The crowds around were working twice as hard, their eyes widened with horror as they chanced glances at the scene. I didn't know how they could do it. For my life, I couldn't tear my eyes away! The intensity of this entire INSANE situation was too much to ignore.

"No!" The clone hissed, eyebrows tilted at a cruel angle. "Then you're just lazy?"

The old man collapsed in his anguish, crying in fear and horror. My heart went out towards him, though, for obvious reasons, I stayed hiding. I was just an observer of a world that had gone entirely wrong in a matter of about two hours.

Seeming to right himself, the man that looked exactly like me, lifted his foot from the old man's neck, staring at the crowds around him. A look of what might have resembled embarrassment went over his features, though, knowing every inch of my own face, I almost got the impression that it was false. He touched the back of his head, a gesture that looked JUST like mine, laughing in an embarrassed tone.

I grimaced, seeing what looked like dark, thin bruises all down his arms. Track-lines similar to those I'd seen on human addicts. Well, I thought to myself, that would explain the fluctuating power level and darkness around his eyes.

"I'm sorry," He apologized, rubbing the back of his neck. "I get so worked up."

The workers slowed down for a second, relief sweeping over them as he grinned, chuckling a little.

"This time of night you know?" He asked them, the intensity in his body leaving as he flopped his arms to his side. He moved towards the old man who still kept his face to the ground, laying on his stomach and shivering at the approach of the tyrant.

"Are you ok?" He asked the old man, sincerely wanting to know. The elder just gazed up at him as the clone knelt down, offering his hand. "I've behaved horribly, I hope you're ok."

The shaky, aged fingers wrapped hesitantly into the palm of the younger man, hopeful eyes looking upwards. The clone smiled softly, placing his fingertips beneath the old man's jaw and running them gently across the soft flesh beneath. I was suddenly struck with the oddest sensation towards this man that looked like me. I realized, he was absolutely one of the most beautiful things I'd ever seen in my entire life, and that realization, nearly knocked me to the ground.

Numbly, the old man nodded, a sweet smile coming to his lips. The same expression was followed by the beautiful tyrant, his eyebrows high and his face resembling mine so completely that I felt almost nauseous suddenly.

With a hitched breath, the old man's entire jawbone and head was torn from its body, the spine snapping and blood shooting into the air! I screamed in horror, a thousand other slaves following suit as crimson was splattered through the air and the spine, still dangling from the head, seemed to dance as he held it up.

"This is what laziness gets you!" He screamed, blood dripping down his face, clouding his eyes with red. "Age is not a factor in MY world!"

He gazed demonically around at the terror-stricken faces, his eyes darting over and then passed me.

"You WILL work and you WILL work hard!" He told them, eyes beaming satanically over the people.

A post near him was only too quickly smacked with a wet sound as he pushed the bloody head over it, a sadistic statue with an old man's screaming face staring wide-eyed at those around him.

"Seven more," He told the men in armor around him. "Seven more posts in a line, right here." He gestured.

The men nodded blankly, eyes on the ground.

"Find seven members of his family," He ordered, his voice raised for everyone to hear. "and put their heads here."

A fresh batch of terrified screams went through the people, gasps and sobs echoing around me. I was too horrified to move, realizing that in my shock, I'd walked away from my hiding place and now stood amongst the workers.

"This!" the monster screamed. "This is the penalty for laziness! You WILL die and I WILL take the lives of those closest to you as penance for it."

As if all on cue, the people threw themselves into their work once more, their pace painful to watch.

"There is NO room in my new world for old age and laziness!" He hollered above the sounds of rapidly moving bodies and the clanks of metal digging into hard soil.

"You there! Albino!"

My breathing hitched as I glanced up, realizing his horrifying gaze was on me. I don't think my heart beat for about 10 seconds as I held his gaze, praying that my disguise and this darkness was enough to conceal the fact that I was more or less his mirror-image.

"Bury him," He spoke, pointing towards what was left of the old man, a gory puddle on the ground. "A piece of shit like that will make some fine FUCKING fertilizer."


	7. Chapter 7

Standing there after he left, I began to convulse painfully, my body and mind coming to screeching haults in their path together. My eyes had seen one thing, that much I knew, but my mind was kicking that backs of my eyes for apparently lying to it.

It was just too weird.

I flew forward, emptying out the contents of my stomach and sulking against the tree. My head was whirling as I held myself in a crouching position, hanging onto the bits of bark on the tree just to keep myself from landing in my vomit. Stars and patches of black flew into my vision and I shook my head, willing them away. Someone was standing over me, asking the cliche "are you ok's" when it was painfully obvious, that uhh, hell no, I wasn't.

"You gonna make it there pal?" A voice asked me, my eyes glancing upwards to catch sight of the brown-haired man from earlier. "Not much for the sight of blood are ya?"

I just shook my head, trying to steady myself.

"Guess not," He answered for me, patting my back in a kind gesture. I weakly smiled up at him, a nod of my head in appreciation.

I slowly climbed to my feet, thankful that he was doing his utmost to help, which might have been difficult considering I was twice his size. I took him in for a moment, his face drawn with age, mouth set in a rather ugly line and stature positively shrieking the word "troll". Still, a set of divine green eyes stared up at me from the cracks of his lids, making me steady myself again. For all his seemingly unattractive features, I realized very quickly, he must have been positively beautiful in his youth.

"You're a big fella'." He told me, smiling a little wider as he let me go.

"Uhh...Thanks." I faltered. "I guess."

"Say, you're REALLY not from around here are you?" He asked, gazing at my whole frame with no apologies. I realized rather quickly that I was much taller than anyone else here, my Saiyan features (alight as they were with the transformation) causing most of the humans to regard me with suspicion. Sets of eyes took me into account and then went back to work, apparently deciding that the drastic demonstration was enough incentive to keep going at their harsh pace.

"Who..." I looked over towards the brown-haired man. "Who WAS that!"

He looked at me skeptically, as if he thought I was making a joke or something.

"Are you kidding me?" He asked seriously. "Where have you BEEN the last ten years!"

I blinked, not having thought about this as much as I figured now that I should have.

"Uhh..." I swallowed, squinting in concentration. "A... Comma?"

"Heh," He looked at me with the skeptical glance again, shaking his head. "Ok."

I figured he didn't believed me but in a world as chaotic as this, I'm sure he doubted very much that I was any sort of threat. He gestured for me to follow him, pulling out his wrist from under his shirt and placing it over a metallic, technical piece of equipment. A strange sound was heard and he winced, pulling back his hand and rubbing his wrist slightly.

"Mine is one of the older models," He told me. "They didn't have the painless cards like they do now back then. Just a slight sting sometimes is all."

I looked at him blankly, staring at the small patch of metal embedded beneath the soft skin of his flesh.

"My time card," He informed. "My 14 hours is up. Time to go home."

"Oh," I nodded, hanging my head slightly. I hadn't thought about that part either, but something told me that barging into ChiChi's home wasn't the greatest idea seens how her present husband seemed to be a deranged, sadistic psychopath. A lonely feeling weld into my gut and, not for the first time that day, I regretted the wish. I hadn't been so confused for so many hours in my entire life and it only seemed to be getting weirder.

"Say," Brown-hair interrupted my thinking. "You got a place to go? At least for this evening?"

"No," I admitted. "I... I guess I don't."

He looked me over, apparently trying to size up whether or not I was "deranged, sadistic psychopath" material or not. I swallowed hard under his scrutiny, looking anywhere but him.

"Meh," He finally said, gesturing with a sweep of his arm. "You seem harmless enough, despite the fact that you look like you just crawled out of a glacier in Iceland. Follow me."

I nodded gratefully, following behind him. We trudged on a path for a while, our pace comfortable as we gazed around through the darkness.

"You hungry?" He asked me. "Didn't seem you kept much of your lunch intact back there."

I blushed a little, smiling.

"Actually," I said thoughtfully, looking up. "I'm starving!"

He laughed a little, a nice sound considering the others I'd heard today. I was learning that I liked him very quickly, admiring his easy-going, devil-may-care attitude despite his circumstances. I wondered at the change ten years ago had made, or maybe, who he was before then. A banker, I decided within myself. A kind, 9 to 5 office prankster.

"I'm uhh..." I glanced down. "I'm afraid I eat a great deal though."

He laughed again, waving off my admittance.

"Not a big problem there. We have an over abundance of food," He shrugged. "Especially considering that famine was entirely wiped off the map about the first three years of his reign."

I was caught off guard by this.

"So," I asked him. "That man back there, that... crazy psycho rules this world?"

He laughed a little, eyes darting around.

"Yeah," He answered me. "But I don't think I'd go around referring to Kakarot that way. Despite your looks, I doubt he'd keep your head welded to your body if he heard you say so."

I frowned at that, trudging onwards.

"You still don't know a lot of things huh?" He asked me, trying to keep pace with me despite the fact that I was supposed to be following him. "I'll bet you're confused as hell huh?"

I grinned.

"I don't even think that could sum it up." I laughed. "I've never been so exasperated and confused in all my life. I feel like the whole world has gone completely and certifiably insane."

He chuckled a little, bobbing his brown head of hair about.

"It has my friend," He said soberly. "It really really has."

We continued on in silence, my stomach growling in protest at how long this was taking. I wanted to just grab up the man, fly through the air and have him point out where abouts we were going, but figured against that idea. So I just trudged on beside him, my eyes darting along the trees that seemed almost too thick as they swayed around us.

"So," He broke the silence. "Do you have a name or should I just call you Albino?"

I felt my face break into a grin again and I shrugged, weighing my options.

"You know," I sighed. "I guess Albino will have to do."

He looked at me oddly before shrugging and moving on.

"I'm Sam." He said simply. It was a perfect name for him.

The home was as Yamcha's had been, down to the wheat for a ceiling, mud walls and the eerie, regular glass windows. Still, a candle had been set inside, welcoming us as we entered to the sound of Sam's adorable wife prattling around the "kitchen" and ushering us inside. I took in the surroundings, figuring the word "simple" didn't quite do it justice.

A plain set of chairs and a small dinning table sat in the expanse of the room, a tiny stove currently being waited on by Sam's wife, and two other chairs in the corner of the room. That was it. Two other rooms resided, one being a bathroom and the other, from what I could see, occupied by one, medium-sized mattress on the floor.

"Ohhh!" A lovely, bell-like voice broke my concentration, two little hands wrapping around my cheeks. "And who is THIS beautiful young man? My goodness, get in here and let me look at you!"

My eyes widened as she pulled my head down to her level, her small, beady eyes gazing at me from behind thick glasses.

"My goodness!" She pronounced. "Why Sam, he's just the most beautiful thing! Can you believe it? This white hair is just marvelous!"

Her little hand was in my strands of hair, sifting through them as she giggled delightfully. As much as I knew I liked Sam, I was falling pretty quickly in love with his wife.

"Oh Lord Jessie," Sam groaned. "Next you'll be asking if we can keep him. I swear, people are like pets to you."

"You better believe I'm gonna be keeping him," She snapped in a sassy way that I loved and distinctly reminded me of Bulma. Her eyes turned back to me and she tapped the side of my face playfully. "My my my, I've never seen anyone quite like you."

"Thank you," I said softly, blushing a little as I looked down.

"Please please," she pulled out a chair from the dinning table. "Have a seat young man. You look positively famished!"

Before I could decline the one of two chairs, she was grabbing another one from the "living room" and nearly throwing Sam into it.

"Sorry," he whispered to me with a smile in his green eyes. "She gets so riled up when I have company over."

I just smiled, waving it off. I didn't want to tell him that I more or less wanted to sweep her up and steal her away. Food was piled up in front of me, my stomach roaring with satisfaction as I, as politely as possible, began to gorge myself with it. Whenever one plate was even close to empty, another was tossed, heaping full in front of me. Oh yes, yes, I wanted to steal Jessie away more than ever!

"So what's you're name, beautiful stranger?" She asked me, a permanent smile on her lovely features.

"Uhh.." I glanced at Sam, swallowing my mouthful of food. "Albino I guess."

She made a quick scoffing sound, slapping Sam's shoulder.

"You gave him that didn't you?" She accused, grinning madly. "Sam Gunther, you're an absolute beast!"

He smiled all the wider, winking over towards me.

"Well geez Jessie," he taunted. "he's your new pet, give em' a name if you want."

I watched the two of them, laughing as I shook my head. For a small second, I wondered if me and ChiChi would have ever become like these two, the sobering thought calming my smile. Sure, they'd probably had fights, undoubtedly went through some hardships; but looking at them now, it was like two best friends choosing to take a road of life together and having fun along the way. They were what marriage was supposed to be, I guessed.

"Castor," She said, waking me from my somber thoughts. "That's what we'll call him."

I raised a pale eyebrow at that.

"That's pretty random," I said softly, liking the name either way.

"No it's not." Sam said, looking oddly at his wife and then returning to his food.

I looked to her for an explanation, taking in her features that looked, for once, a little forlorn.

"Castor is what I wanted to name my boy," she said gently. "if I ever had one."

I mouthed an 'oh', finishing up my last plate of food.

"You look like a Castor," She told me, sitting in front of me and waving her little fingers through the silvery locks of my hair. "My, but those eyes of yours."

I tried not to look down in embarrassment, since she was obviously gazing at my eyes, wondering if I ought to keep my odd features more concealed and then deciding against it.

"So pale," She said it sweetly. "So blue. Castor, you can make even an old woman's heart beat a little bit faster."

I laughed a little at that, watching as she left to start washing the dishes. I looked over seriously at Sam though, moving a bit closer.

"I need to know some things." I told him. "I need to know what happened ten years ago. I need to understand things."

He nodded, standing from the table and taking his chair with us to the 'living room'. I gave a quick but enthused 'thank you' to Jessie, being waved off with a smile as I joined him.

"Start from the beginning if you will," I told him.

He leaned back in his chair, preparing for the long explanation ahead.

"It started as oddly as it exists now," He told me, hands folded in his lap. "Ten world leaders were kidnapped, all within one day. Everyone thought it was some sort of terrorist conspiracy, I mean how, how in one day could all these world leaders be taken captive? But it was just one man. Just one. Soon, a television company picked up a signal being launched towards them. They broadcasted it, the face of ..." He faltered. "Of Kakarot right in front of the screen. "Show them," is what he said. "Show the whole world."

He shook his head, expression hardened.

"We all watched for 15 days as he broadcasted every world leader, altogether in one room, dying off."

My breath hitched at that, Sam's head nodding along with me.

"Guess he released Ebola on them," he told me. "made every person capable of seeing television watch as their own leaders and others were slowly coughing up blood," He cringed. "Puking it, crying it, shitting it out. Just dying off in the worst way, right for everyone to see."

He paused, breathing a pent up sigh.

"It worked though." He spoke. "It worked marvelously for him. Everyone was terrified, trying to trace the signal, to find out where these men were. By the 15th day, most of them were dead anyways and by the 16th, Kakarot had introduced himself to the world in the only way he knew how: shockingly. He would display horrific feights of strength against the United States Military, taking entire bombs and cannons and everything head on, coming back with more fire power than any of them. Right out of his hands, like... like he was God or something. Just blowing away every military operation they could send to him.

"He was also merciless, making sure people saw that he wouldn't hold back from killing women, kids, anyone. Eventually, he had the whole world scared shitless of him, some countries even erecting enormous statues of him, just to show their allegiance. He told people to leave the cities, those that didn't listen, killed in enormous blasts as he took out the largest cities first. He didn't think that people were created to live like that, the rich prospering and the poor just scrapping by. He balanced everything out, put everyone on everyone else's level. No rich, no poor.

"The countries that absolutely refused to bow down, he unleashed amazing amounts of the Ebola virus on them, though how he did it, I'm not even sure. Rats carried it to the poor and the rich, he unleashed it in their water systems. Took out entire countries that way and then burned what was left of them. He made public killings to spook the populace of countries into obedience, disemboweling emperors and spraying their guts out all over their palaces.

"When finally, people stopped fighting and rebel groups were taken out, he wiped out all religion from the face of the earth. He told us that religion had been the cause for more deaths and wars than he ever had and thus, we would be united when it was forgotten. He was the only thing worth worshipping he said.

"Eventually, he arranged "cities" by separating the remaining humans into two hundred person groups, giving out assignments. We weren't to live as we had before. There were no secular jobs or schools or computer technology. Scientific establishments were basically wiped out, save for Capsule Corp."

"What happened to Capsule Corp?" I asked him, my heart beating wildly.

"It still stands," He shrugged. "Bulma Briefs, the president, was the first to help him with all of this, the main reason his techniques made such an impact. He was the brute strength and she was the technology."

I tried to sort out this information, shaking my head from the confusion.

"Is she still alive?" I asked, my heart beating in my ears.

"Sure," he said, staring at me oddly and taking in my reaction to all this. "She's still around, last I heard. Doesn't make many public appearances, that's for sure."

I nodded, gesturing for him to continue.

"As I told you," He said. "Famine was completely none-existent by the first three years, every human's part in rebuilding the planet magnificently efficient. There are those that make the clothing for the workers, those that make the food, those that ship it off, those that oversee everything. But you won't find an occupation based or set with any other goal besides rebuilding the earth. As he said, we spent our entire lives up until that point polluting, overpopulating, sucking away the natural goodness of the earth. So, we'll spend the remainder of our time here regrowing what we'd taken.

"He's big on family though, you saw that yourself. He never separated families when combining the "cities". They all were to stay together, never to be put asunder, or so he words it. But the idea of that is only too horrific, as you witnessed today, when people make mistakes. He doesn't just kill the offending member; he kills them all."

"But why?" I pleaded, shaking my head in disgust. "Why be such a monster?"

"Maybe we don't know everything," he shrugged his shoulders, reminding me again that he was a very practical, logical man. "I was told once that he, in one of his infamous drug-sprees, informed all in attendance that it was a crueller thing to leave the family alive. That living in a world void of those you love is perhaps the cruelest fate a man can meet with. He sees it as a kindness to an extent, setting them 'all free from the face of the earth', quote un-quote. He is... as you said before, a psycho. He's completely deranged and drunk on power, in love with himself and a temperamental drug-addict."

"A drug addict?" I looked at him oddly, recalling the track-marks I'd seen on his arms and unable to believe it.

"Do you really think a sane man could sleep at night if he wasn't?" He told me. "You really think a sane, sober man could murder children and old people and not weep when he looked in a mirror? No. Kakarot needs those drugs, needs that chaotic release. Sometimes, I think everyone else on earth understands him more than he even understands himself. Othertimes though, I think we see only a monster because we're too afraid to see a man."

I sat in silence for a moment, contemplating this.

"I just cannot believe that Bulma Briefs would aid him in this," I finally spoke it, perhaps now more confused than even before. "I know her or.. well, I did know her. Some time ago, you imagine and..." I shook my head. "I just can't see it. I can't see someone like her, as kind and pure as her, aiding him to kill and enslave people."

"Well," He agreed. "Maybe you're right and maybe you're wrong. Maybe there's so much more to even that story that we don't rightly know. A beautiful girl like that, hiding from the world for years? I don't see it. Ten years before all this, that woman's face was on the cover of damn near every magazine and I doubt ten years short time would have really changed that so dramatically. If she wanted to be seen, she would be."

"What about her father?" I perked up suddenly.

"That's another mystery," He leaned back further, wiping his eyes with tiredness. I was grateful to him for taking the time he had, afraid I was wearing out my welcome with these incessant questions. "And don't get me wrong, from what I knew of the man, he was always something of a recluse but now? I've only ever been told that he literally works almost 24 hours out of the day, never even moving outside for weeks, working away for Kakarot."

I buried my face in my hands, exasperated.

"No one fights anymore?" I finally asked. "No one rebels, no one even tries?"

"Who is there to try?" He asked me. "Groups of two hundred people aren't enough to stop him. He was nearly flawless in his take-over, quick and efficient. We're hopeless now."

I sighed, leaning back finally.

We sat quietly for a moment, listening to the sounds of Jessie's hussle and bussle in the kitchen. I didn't even try to make sense of everything, tiredness taking away the incentive to mull over questions I wasn't going to get an answer for.

"I know I should sleep," Sam finally broke the silence, gazing at his wife. "But sometimes, I stay up all night just looking at her."

I smiled slightly, admiring his emotional attachment despite the fact that he was far from an eccentric person.

"She's beautiful." I told him honestly.

"She's mortal," he whispered.

I looked at him strangely, remarking within myself what an unusual thing it was for him, a human, a mortal himself, to say.

"Sometimes I think, we as humans, don't understand mortality," He explained himself. "At least, not until it's too late. I don't see myself as mortal because I'm not dying. I have another 10-15 years in me. Death doesn't really touch me the way that it does her."

I looked over, my heart seeming to sink as he went on.

"Is she sick?" I asked him.

"She's growing older," He answered. "We had wanted to start a family together, so long ago. Castor," He chuckled with little humor. "I nearly forgot that's what we named him. My son, that is."

I waited for him to go on, feeling heavy with tiredness and even some grief.

"A still born," he explained. "Born dead. I think he nearly took her with him.

"Sometimes, women are such an enigma to me, you know? Men will forever look to their ancestors for the key to ruling the world and woman, in one way or another, will still be in control. They're something so much more than us. Not just wires and veins and occasional ideas. They change everything they touch. Do you realize what a gift that is? To transform the entire world around you just by walking each day in it?

"When she lost Castor, I swore she'd leave me too. There's something about an unborn child dying that we as men will never understand. When she lay in that hospital bed, just staring off into nothing, she told me if felt like every day, God had made her a promise and then took it back. She felt cheated I guess, though it's a poor way to word it. She says now that if it weren't for me, she would have just drifted off to sleep and never woken up again. We live for each other, every day.

"My world consists of my 14 hours spent thinking of her, and the rest, spent being with her. She makes me the man I am. And I'm going to be losing her soon."

I swallowed hard, not understanding.

"Old age doesn't belong anywhere in this world," He looked at me. "Kakarot saw to that. The least amount of hours a person can work is 10 a day. And Jessie, though she never complains, struggles with those more than she'll ever let on. When she can't complete her 10, she's seen as unfit for work and then, unfit for life. 'A human life has no purpose if it cannot complete 10 hours of labor towards the earth that spawned it.' So they send them to factories."

"Factories?"

"They call them rest homes," he sighed. "but everyone knows what they are. The modern day concentration camps, except there is no labor there. Only death."

I caught my breath again, every gasp of my lungs feeling heavy.

"They kill them swiftly," He said in a hard voice. "or so I'm told. But they put them down like dogs and then burn the bodies. Same with the terminally sick and the deformed. Two, maybe three years I have left with her, Castor. And then, they'll drag her away from me and that will be our goodbye. Get used to it son," He said, crawling to his feet. "The world you awoke in is just another living nightmare."

With that, he walked into the kitchen, kissing his wife and helping her with the dishes.

I didn't sleep a wink the whole night.


	8. Chapter 8

There were enough questions in the morning to make my head spin, insomnia never having been a problem in my life until right about then. Sam had woken early, probably for his shift, mistaking me for sleeping before quietly making his exit.

I thought over him for a while, his attitude despite circumstances. It had always been something I admired about humans: their adaptability. I had long ago, as a child, met a holocaust survivor, a dear old friend of Master Roshi's. Showing me the odd tattoo in his forearm, he relayed to me stories of absolute terror, nights spent on a cot with five other men, starvation and disease rampant around them. It seemed to me at the time that the cost of life had become absurdly low, the ideas of injustice spiking my temperament.

After he'd finished, I recall asking him "how." How could he survive that? Where was the incentive to live amongst such horrors and not want to give up? He'd basically shrugged it off, telling me that thoughts of his wife and children (though none had actually survived) kept him going. "Memories," he'd said. "And the hope to make new ones."

It had dawned on me, even at such a tender age, that humans were an exceptional creation. Perhaps more-so than even their original creator had intended. The human ability to adapt to things they never imagined they could, always represented to me, a supernatural spirit within them. They never even realized their own strength of self until they were forced to find it.

A compelling idea that Sam and Jessie now showed me in every moment I spent within their simple home. So many things lost, I wondered at. So many thousand things forgotten, yet he still managed to kiss her softly before he left. The simplicities of a human life now shown for their own basic complexities. Truly, their God must marvel at them.

I wondered for a moment what a day would be like in Sam's worn out shoes? I wondered how he dared to leave his home, or dared to breathe a goodbye to his wife, knowing that every second now was as precious as his last. What was it like to imagine for a second that he wouldn't have the commodity of his wife soon? That one day, without real warning, she'd be stolen from him, shipped off like cargo and put to sleep like a terminal animal?

What world was this? True, I supposed that in the long run, and the logical contemplation of facts, there was no REAL purpose for the elderly. What did they add to the world but knowledge of what it once was? If I were to think like Kakarot, I would understand that the human knowledge of history, at this point, was a great error. Future generations would never truly know what they were missing in life (freedom being at the top of list) if they were born into one of slavery. Truly, total eradification WAS, in retrospect, a good idea.

My thinking made me ill for a moment, my brow furrowed as I realized the stupidity of it. 'Don't think like him', I warned myself. 'Don't allow yourself to understand his reasoning. It will poison you.'

I stood up weakly, rubbing my tired eyes.

So many questions.

Kakarot himself, at this point, was an enigma to me. He looked like me, he'd taken on my Saiyan name, but by all means, there was a VERY real difference between us. What paths had we traveled that had set us on two entirely different ones in life? What steps had he seen beneath his shoes that put us on parallel lines, going the opposite direction the other was?

No, there was no real proof that we were entirely two different people. I didn't have that commodity. No, he was me but at the same time, I refused to accept that IN THAT FACT... I was supposedly him.

I shook my head.

Time and age itself had taught me the lessons of sociology, enough so to understand that our childhoods, our surroundings and our lives in general could set one person on an entirely different path than he was originally intended for. But how extreme were Goku's and Kakarot's differences? Or more specifically, recalling the crude track-marks on Kakarot's arms, what had happened to him? Who was he and WHY?

I grit my teeth, tying my shoes. I didn't know what I would be dealing with only knowing that moping around Jessie's house was doing neither of us any good. I had to find answers and a gut feeling told me precisely where I'd get them.

"Castor?"

I shut my eyes, cursing my bad luck. I had realized it would probably be rude to leave without expressing my gratitude for Sam and Jessie's kindness, but I was only too aware of the things needing to be accomplished that day.

She had walked up beside me, taking my face once more into her hands and pulling me down to her level.

"You're leaving us, aren't you." She stated, not waiting for my answer. "There are things you need to do."

I nodded, grateful for her understanding.

"Where will you go?" She whispered, eyes expressing some sadness within them.

"I don't really know," I admitted. "I ..."

She smiled, urging me to continue.

"I had a wife once," I said softly. "before, you know. And... I believe she can make me understand somethings that... don't rightly make sense."

"Like," She shrugged. "Why exactly you look identical to Kakarot?"

I almost gasped aloud, realizing that my eyebrows were higher and I was gawking at her. She laughed lightly, patting my face.

"I'm old darling," She said with a smile. "But not that old."

"How..." I shook my head. "Why would you let me stay with you both then? If you noticed that I... look just like that bastard?"

She laughed softly again, the sound reminding me over and over of sweet clanking bells.

"Because 'that bastard', isn't you." she told me, tangling her fingers in my soft hair. "You have a good heart in you Castor. That's why I gave you the name."

She pulled me into an embrace, my shoulders slumped until I finally couldn't handle being bent so far over and just lifted her off the ground into my arms.

"I gave you the name," she whispered. "To separate you. To make you understand the difference. You aren't like him."

She pulled back, looking hard and serious into my eyes.

"You aren't like him," She repeated. "And promise me you won't forget that."

I nodded, whispering that I promised. I held her against me for just a moment longer, wondering why it was that I craved human touch quite like I did in that moment. Was it because it'd been sometime since I'd touched another person? Or because I'd seen the flaws of not appreciating the wonder that they were?

Letting her down finally, I let her kiss both my cheeks, sinking into the sublime scent of her kindness, the way sweetness seemed to roll off her body.

"I won't forget you," I breathed into her hair. "Neither of you."

"Be sure you don't." She replied sassily.

Before I left, she was sure to throw in a few more plates of food, stuffing me before letting me loose. Hugs and kisses later, I was flying into the air, loving the soft hitch in her breath. Truly, I thought to myself, an amazing creature a human was.

I walked among the ashes of my home, the ground still seemingly burnt by flame, though many years had obviously passed. The burnt pieces of wood still stood, the foundations of what was once a meager home full of memories. Years must have passed over the wreckage of the house, vines covering over blackened counters that now struck me as ancient.

A blackened toy lay, half smashed the soil as I bent down to examine it. I held the old plastic bear in my hand, the soot from fire staining my fingers as I tried to clean it off. An exaggerated smile gleamed up at me, shimmering slightly in the sunlight as I moved it this way and that. It had been my son's. I remembered giving that to him years before.

What had happened here? I looked to the side. Where was Chichi? And why couldn't I sense Gohan?

I winced standing up, cringing as I lifted my foot off of broken glass, a small piece of it embedded into the sole of my thin shoe. I ground my teeth, picking it out and holding the tiny shard before my eyes. Small traces of blood glimmered over dirty, dim glass, my eye catching sight of something on the other side. The sun had hit the piece of glass just right, illuminating a burned stack of papers. I squinted my eyes, trodding lightly over towards them, limping on my tender foot.

I knelt down, picking up the small bits of paper gingerly, fearful they might crumple. They were years old, stained by smoke and brownish. Sides and entire pieces were singed and black, though the writing was somewhat legible.

I carried the stack lightly, my eyes never leaving the pages as I sat on a stump, moistened with lush overgrowth. To my surprise, I realized it was a journal, though a thin one. Some of the first pages were entirely unreadable, too stained to make out the words correctly; but as I sorted, dates became clear and finally, entire sections perfectly understandable.

I began to read.

**April 3rd, 1994 **

Master Roshi always tells me to write in this thing. Hell, he's told me that since I was a kid. "Write it down kiddo", he swears. "you never know what you'll learn from yourself." I always tease him that he has enough "reading literature" that I hardly feel the need to indulge him further. Creepy old guy. Gotta love him. Krillin wants to spar today. Probably should though I don't exactly know what good it will do. Between us, I spend more time in my sparring sessions (and more energy) attempting NOT to accidentally take his head off than actually honing any skills in the process. Ah well. He tries and I know it means a lot that he keep up with it. Eases his mind to think if the time ever came, he could stand beside me and fight for something he cares about.

ChiChi hates when I go out, more so now than ever. I don't know why it always has to be such a process with her but I'm definitely looking forward to the usual song and dance we go through when I want time away. That was sarcasm. She'll tell me I can't take Gohan, as if I actually would. Sometimes I think his supposed 'lust for violence' (as she refers to it) is more just a plea for time with me. Like he has to have the same goals and interests as I do.

Sometimes, we're just too different. All of us.

**  
May 28th, 1994 **

Saiyan. I figure I'm thinking about this right now because me and ChiChi are in a fight. She just doesn't understand me. No one does. Can't blame them, neither do I. Maybe that's my biggest downfall. I don't know who I am. Radditz told me I wasn't human and ever since then, I can only see the differences. That's all. I feel so isolated sometimes, like I'm the only person in the entire universe left that knows who I am and what I'm capable of.

Why am I so different?

Why do I love power? Why do I love to fight? Why do I have this sadistic need to sometimes destroy and conquer? Why does my heart skip a beat at the sight of blood? Why does death and destruction excite me so much?

And why do I have no one to talk to about this?

Sometimes, I just wish so badly that I hadn't killed my brother, my only link to what I am. Sometimes, I just wish there was someone else to show me. To show me something that makes sense. To show me I'm not crazy.

**  
May 30th, 1994**

See? I'm trying to keep up with this thing! Ha! Won't Master Roshi be so proud, two days in one month I've kept up on this damn journal thingie. I guess I don't mind it so much. I've never been much one for writing but I do have secrets and what else is this thing for? Besides... who else do I have to talk to? A bunch of humans, that's who. An entire race that would probably cringe if I told them the truth about myself.

That's right. I love blood. I love the way it tastes, I love the way it flies out of flesh, I love to feel it leak over my skin. A vampiric fascination with bloodshed.

They'd all be horrified. I don't blame them.

Sometimes I scare myself.

I cut my wrist the other day. Yeah, that's right. I'm not ashamed to write it here. It wasn't out of any morbid suicidal fantasy. I just wanted to see blood. I wanted to watch the way it moves and that distinct color that you can't even recreate. I loved to watch it drip out of white flesh that isn't human. God, I want someone to tell me why I liked it so much. God, I want someone to tell me why I loved it so much.

Is anyone out there?

**June 8th, 1994 **

I cut my wrist again. ChiChi caught me this time, or more, noticed the after affects of my fantastical gory trip. It's like a drug to me or something. A kind of high or rush that makes me finally understand the human addict's need for more. I sat in the bathtub and I used her pink little razor to make tiny gouges over my forearm. It was-I laugh now--it was so beautiful. The kind of beautiful an artist can't recreate no matter how hard they try. The moving, trickling sensation of my life leaving my veins, only so quickly replaced by more of the fluid.

I don't want to die, yet that's what ChiChi is convinced I'm doing. She thinks I hate her so completely that my only endeavor is to escape her and Gohan. That's just stupid. If I wanted to, I could. What are they to me but human? I'm something so much more. I am. I know it. That's why I'm not ashamed of my fascination and love affair with the morbid.

They can whisper all they like in their tiny rooms and jaded walls. They can speak a millions rumors and theories and that's all they will ever be. Human rumors and theories.

I'm beyond that. This love affair is beyond that. Someone out there must understand me. I can't be alone.

I just can't be.

**  
June 9th, 1994 **

I had a weird dream last night. I dreamt that I was standing in a room and for the first time in my life, I felt like I belonged somewhere. Shadows moved amongst me, yet I was one of them. They were Saiyans, just like I am.

Isolation melted. The undeniable inability to share myself was gone and suddenly every masochistic and sadistic thing I've ever done seemed perfectly natural. They were all laughing at my antics, laughing at the fact that I was so worried over cutting my wrist; laughing that I thought there was something wrong with me for liking the color of blood.

But it wasn't the same sort of laughter I'd heard from humans. It was more lighthearted and teasing than that. Not the withdrawn, humorless chuckling that was accompanied by tense looks and hard swallows. Humans: I hate the word.

In my dream, a shadow came up to me. Just a shadow. He touched my arm and called me the same odd name that my brother had. "Kakarot."

That's when I woke up.

**  
June 10th, 1994 **

I must be going crazy but something feels like it's wrong. Something is missing.

Like... sometimes I just feel like something or someone is missing.

They should be here.

**July 14, 1994 **

Sorry it's been a while. I looked back at my writings and saw the uselessness of it all. Why am I bothering now even? Pages and ink don't fill a void. Nothing will. I'm alone because I make myself alone. I tear myself away from everyone around me because I stupidly believe that they don't understand me. Or more, that their inability to understand me makes them hate me or something. That's stupid.

Yamcha told me the other day that he firmly believes I have an inferior complex over a superior complex. That I'm so afraid of thinking I'm better than they are that I isolate myself from them, making myself feel bad or something.

He's wrong.

I already know I'm better. I already know I'm capable of so many things that I'll never accomplish.

I'm a monster. Or I could be a monster. Or I should be a monster.

I don't even know anymore. What the fuck am I supposed to be? A dad. A husband. A hero.

How cartoonish. Can't anyone understand or even accept this need within me? Can't anyone tell me why I can't stand humans anymore?

No.

I'm alone because I make myself alone. I kind of wish now that Radditz had never come here; had never told me the difference between myself and everyone else. Because now? I want to explore that. I want to know how much stronger I am than they are. I want to hurt them, to squeeze the life out of their fragile, pathetic bodies and see blood. And I don't want to be ashamed of that anymore. I don't.

As much as I guess I wish Radditz had never told me the truth, I suppose I'm glad. At least now I understand why I'm such a freak, however inconclusive the facts are.

Meh, I have to go. Gohan caught a cold the other day at summer school (I'm sure the poor kid just LOVES the fact that she makes him go there) and he's calling. Probably a good thing. I never write anything positive in this stupid journal anyways.

I really ought to throw this out.

**  
July 15th, 1994 **

Another fight with the wife. The wife. Ha. Cracks me up when men refer to a woman as "the wife", like we're tied down. Might as well call mine "the cage". 'Nother fight with the old 'iron bars'.

I gotta chuckle a little bit at that. Kind of hurts. I haven't laughed much these days.

Restless I guess.

Constant feeling like somehow, the plans of fate have been fucked with and something that ought to be in my life isn't. Such a stupid, eerie, ridiculously human feeling. Gohan hasn't gotten over that cold and now ChiChi (in all her irritableness) is starting to cough a little bit here and there.

Heh, this is an odd thought, but I think when she coughs and gets all flushed, she looks really beautiful. Yeah, odd thought.

**  
July 16th, 1994 **

Yep, they both have it. Stupid colds. I guess another reason to be grateful I'm Saiyan. Such a pretty word.

Gohan has had the damn hiccups all day long and this weird rash. ChiChi claims she's too sick to do anything about it so I just gave him the calamine lotion and said to hell with it. I'm no doctor.

He said he was too tired to put it on so I guess I'll have to eventually do it for him. So odd, it's really not like him to act that way. ChiChi, yes. She loves attention. But Gohan? Nah. He's usually pretty resourceful.

With his high immune system (thanks to me) it should clear up in a few days. Poor kiddo! haha.. but at least he doesn't have to go to summer school today.

**  
July 17th, 1994 **

This is getting weird. I have a really bad feeling in the pit of my stomach and I don't know why. The school called a few times but I didn't answer it. I've never been good with phones and ChiChi is out like a light. Oh well.

I wonder what I'll do today. I want to go out sparring. Maybe I will. I ought to call Krillin or Yamcha or someone. I have to sigh at that thought, you knew I would. What a waste of time.

I really wish I had a better sparring partner. A Saiyan partner. Someone who could ACTUALLY test my limits. My only 'testing of limits' these days is when Yamcha goes and on about how much Bulma likes him and I have to constantly coerce myself out of bashing his head in. What an egotistical dork. Honestly.

Oh yeah, and ChiChi and Gohan are still sick. Ho hum. Boring day.

**  
July 18th, 1994 **

I can't shake this odd feeling. Something at the pit of my stomach is telling me I need to call the doctor. Meh, don't have his number anyways.

I worked out a bit this morning, trying to shake this strange tension. ChiChi is coughing something awful and Gohan... man. Something just isn't right. I touched his head this morning, trying to copy how ChiChi does it (or would if she would get out of bed) and wow. I didn't think human skin or otherwise could even GET that hot naturally. High temperature.

Constant hiccupping. Coughing, rash and... I don't even like writing this because it makes the turning in my stomach pull into a tight knot but, when I took Gohan to the bathroom today, I swear, it sounds wierd saying I looked but afterwards, ... I swear he shit out blood or something. God, it was so weird.

I'll call the doctor tomorrow. This just doesn't feel right. And... is that...is that blood on the sheets?

**  
July 19th, 1994 **

The doctor won't come. I called him 6 times now and all he'll say is that he's busy. He's lying. I don't have to be Saiyan to know that. Something has him spooked. Maybe I should call the school and see if any other kids are having weird symptoms like this.

I touched Gohan's arm today and it was so hot it almost hurt me. Like something is going on inside his body that's like... melting him. There has been brown spots on ChiChi and Gohan's sheets and I know it's blood. I can smell it.

Shit, someone is throwing up.

**  
July 20th, 1994 **

Gohan is now throwing up blood. Shit, I can't take this. I just can't deal with this. Something feels so wrong here. Dende came today and I asked him to do something. ChiChi is quickly becoming as bad as Gohan is, coughing like... like I've never heard anyone cough before. I think at any moment she's going to just barf up a lung or something. I smell death here constantly.

So I begged Dende to heal them. When I asked him at first, he thought it was an absurd request, swearing that he wasn't a doctor and shouldn't have to make housecalls. He's as white as a green man can be now. And I just have this feeling that the healing isn't working.

ChiChi started to cry only a few minutes ago and God... God FUCK SHIT FUCK...she's fucking crying blood!

**  
July 21th, 1994 **

I don't think I believe in God anymore. I think there's this big other dimension on the other side that is just as corrupt and Godless as this one. There is no God. I looked into ChiChi's eyes this morning, and I know it. I just saw that.

She's bleeding everywhere now. I can't keep clean towels. She just bleeds all over them. Like her heart is pumping enough to keep every orifice in her body leaking blood. It comes out of her nose with every weak breath she takes in. She shits blood all over our sheets and I can't keep changing them. It's like her skin almost falls off when I move her. She's so hot to the touch I'm afraid her skin is going to become liquid soon.

I don't understand anything. I don't know anything anymore.

I just know I can't lose them. I can't fucking watch them die.

How could I write what I wrote? That they're humans? That I'm above them? Yet here I am, on the floor beside her bed and I feel like I can't get up. I think I've been here for hours, just listening to her cough, weak as it is now. It sounds like rasping. Like the last rasping breaths of a dying old man.

Please don't leave me. Please don't die ChiChi. Please.

I feel my own tears. I don't cry much but I have to. I have to fucking cry. I have to believe that there is hope.

Tears give me hope that I'm still a man and that there is still a God and that there are still miracles.

A man called about an hour ago, asking if my family was sick. I don't know if he made much out of my blubbering, as I hollered and screamed for him to help us, to get us out of here.

"Send help," I screamed, sounding like a mad man. "Please send help, God, they're fucking dying!"

He just hung up. He fucking hung up.

And I'm a coward. I can't even make myself go to Gohan's room. I'm so afraid. I'm so afraid he's dead or something and that ChiChi will know. She'll follow him if she thinks he's dead. I swear, she won't hold on anymore.

I hear her coughing now and it's wet with blood. She just vomited again, pieces of her innards clotting on her chin. I don't even have the strength to wipe it off. I'm a coward.

God, I'm such a fucking coward.

**  
July 22nd, 1994 **

I asked Gohan last night when he had started to feel sick. 12 days ago. 12. 12 days it took to put him into a comma. At least that's where I think he's at. I tried to pull him up to me, to hold him as he sunk deeper and deeper into a sleep that I know he won't wake up from. As I pulled him up, I felt the tissue in his arm give way and separate over his bone. I took my own son's arm off just trying to hug him.

I don't like the sight of blood anymore.

**  
July 23rd, 1994 **

Gohan died last night.

**  
July 24th, 1994 **

She keeps asking me to bring him to her. She wants to see his body. She knows I'm lying when I tell her he's gotten better.

"I just don't want him to see you," I lied. I think it's a cruel lie now. "I don't want him to see you so sick. So get better and I'll bring him in ok?"

She could hear the lie in my voice.

"He's dead isn't he?" She screamed. I didn't know a person could be so loud with bloody chunks of stomach spurting from between their teeth. "He's fucking dead!"

I just coward in the corner of the room and cried like a child. Cried like I'm crying now. Can't stain the paper too much.

What makes a man's soul? I thought 14 days ago I knew everything. I thought 14 days ago that my biggest problem in life was that I was missing something. But missing and losing are two different things. I can't bring myself to say goodbye to my wife. I've tried everything.

Dende couldn't heal them. The dragon won't save them or bring them back. The man on the phone never called again.

God. Fuck God.

Sorry, God isn't here right now, please leave a message.

**  
July 25th, 1994 **

Well, I said goodbye. She already slipped into a comma when I said it. Her eyes are now staring at the ceiling, last bits of blood reaching down her pale, bloated skin. She died a few hours ago I think. I don't know. She looked dead for days before so I don't know. I don't know anything.

I thought I knew there was a God. I thought I knew there was a purpose for life. I thought a man's purpose in the world is to add what he can to it before he leaves. I thought that God put us here to grow upon each other, to learn what we can from our days of life and to improve the lives of those around us while we can. I thought that the purpose of life was to love.

I thought a lot of things before.

Does this entertain him? I'm curious. I really want to know.

I'm laying beside her. My wife. My iron bars. I feel more isolated now than I ever have in my life. I can't get up. I can't leave. I think I'll just lie here for a while. Yeah, I need a good nap.

I want to die. I want to die.

I want that same reckless courage I had a few months back, where I cut myself out of curiosity.

I think back now to a time when things were ok. Maybe things were never perfect but they were ok. I remember Gohan's laughter. I wish I could have heard that one more time. Yeah, that would have been better than hacked out pleas that I don't leave him.

"Stay," That's all he said for the last couple days before he sank under the comma. "Stay."

I think now on sunny times. The rays of sunlight on my wife's hair, the tears that glittered in the corners of her eyes when she laughed too hard. Picnics, naps, walks in the park. The first day I taught Gohan how to fly. The first birthday present he bought me, "Number One Daddy" written on the side of a mug. I wish he would have called me "daddy" one more time too. It always made me happy when he did.

Daddy. Daddy.

I looked in the mirror this morning, my hands still stained with the clotted blood that was splattered all over the sink. I don't care. I just stared in the mirror as I heard her last gasps, her strangled swear words, her promises she was getting better and needed to see her son. I just listened when she screamed horrible words.

"I'm dying," she screamed, the voice wet. "I'm fucking dying! Bring him. Bring me his body Goku, I swear to you! Bring me his fucking body! I want to die with my son. You bring him here! Goku, can you hear me!"

I closed my eyes.

"I'll come back for you," She promised, voice menacing and sick with death. "I swear I will make you pay if you don't bring me his body right now you FUCKING COWARD!"

I don't know if it was her or the disease that spoke that. Probably both.

I just stared at the mirror, listening to her choked promises and vomiting. The man in the mirror just stared back. I wish sometimes that I aged like they did. The twenty year old stared back into the eyes of a man that has aged 2,000 years in 15 days. Why can't I look different? Why can't the reflection show the gapping wounds? Why can't I bare the scars that 15 days have inflicted?

I finally just knelt at her side, watching her body convulse and spit up last bits of blood as she began to sink into death, her innards puddy by now.

"I'm sorry," I told her. I think I told her that a thousand times. I think I said a lot of things a thousand times and none of them brought her back to me. I hated God, yet I prayed to him so much the last few days. It was out of morbid comfort to myself. No one was listening. No one could save them.

They're gone now and I'm more alone than I have ever been. I thought that I was missing something for so long that now that I am, I feel selfish for it. I had a family once. I had rays of sunshines and birthdays. I had a baby boy to call me daddy.

The world became ashes in 15 days.

One day, years ago, a man married a beautiful woman. He promised to love, honor, uphold and protect that woman, until death set them apart. One day, a man fell in love with a beautiful girl and made a baby with her.

And today, that man died too.

**  
July 26th, 1994 **

I can hear them outside the house. I'm still laying in our bed. I hear the swishing of plastic suits and see the whiteness of their apparel through foggy windows. They think we're all dead. The whooshing of air filtering through plastic tubing comes near the window. He sees me. He thinks I'm dying.

Maybe I am.

I can hear what sounds like flames. They're going to burn this place to the ground. Let them. There are only cinders here anyways.

Besides, human flame can never touch the inferno that blazes within me now.

One day, a beautiful woman and a tired little boy died. The man soon followed. And from the ashes of a great fire tore forth a Phoenix, a monster, raging with life.

Two people died yesterday in this bed. And something else was born today.

I swear to God they'll pay. I'll make every fucking one of them pay.


	9. Chapter 9

My chest felt so heavy that I slumped backwards, nearly falling off the stump that held me. Weight was on my chest, my heart feeling as though every beat was pushing up tons of cold rock. I searched frantically through the papers, praying there was more or even, (in a very human means of self consolation), praying he would have written that it was all just a big joke, ha ha.

But that page wasn't there.

I felt tears contort behind my eyes and I let out a soft cry of frustration. I let the papers fall, steadying myself before just slumping to the ground as my knees could no longer hold my weight.

They were gone.

I looked upwards as tears bled into my eyes, my blinking rapid as I tried to hold them down. How could this have happened? I'd left a world where I'd virtually broken my family's heart for selfish means, taken them both for granted because I wanted more and now? I came to a world where someone that was virtually "me" had been destroyed by watching them die. Did they have that much power over me? Or was that just another difference between me and Kakarot?

Things began to slowly make sense and I wasn't given the warm shield of confusion anymore. The clearer things got, the colder the world around me seemed.

I had done this. This was MY fault.

I had wished away Kakarot's one link to who he truly was. I'd taken away the one person that could teach him the strengths AND the limitations of being Saiyan. With only Radditz's crude knowledge to guide him, Kakarot had begun to believe that he was supposed to be a monster, SUPPOSED to have conquered the human world. Now, at odds with his original creation, he stumbled around a world where the injustices seemed too great to handle. He didn't know that Saiyans and humans weren't really so different. He didn't know that both were given the ideas of conscience and soul and had rules of decency to abide by.

He didn't know that Vegeta would eventually form attachments to others that WEREN'T his kind. He wouldn't know that me and Vegeta would eventually fight side by side to protect the humans, including their basic rights and freedoms.

He only knew that he was at complete odds with everyone and everything around him. He only knew that instinctually, he was different. He craved bloodshed (as I did), he was physically infinitely superior and he was originally intended to enslave the human populace.

And when his family died a horrific, cruel death, he only knew that he had the power to correct it from ever happening again.

For a moment, my mind was expanded with one odd thought: we take for granted the impact of others in our lives.

I had never realized that Vegeta's precense in my life had made me who I am today. I had never appreciated the time we spent together or the things he'd taught me; the limitations of who we allow ourselves to become. We COULDN'T just behave like monsters, although we wanted to. We COULDN'T just gorge ourselves in blood and violence, although every fiber in our bodies wanted it.

We weren't monsters; we were men.

I was completely aware of my differences because I had a guide to explain them to me; their feelings, their effects, their weaknesses. I knew how to control my desires because I had someone that was a walking example of how cruelty and violence would eventually take its toll. I learned not to be a monster because I had Vegeta to make my mistakes for me.

Also, I had someone to ultimately beat out my frustrations upon. Our sparring sessions had rarely ever been about becoming stronger (at least in my case) or becoming better. More or less, we just needed to vent out our powers on occasion and knew, that in the world, we were the only two that could ultimately survive each other.

But what if I'd never had that?

I lowered my head. I'd be just like him.

"I thought I'd find you here."

My heart beat so loud I thought my ears would explode, my eyes very slowly creeping to the side. A soft sigh escaped and I felt relief sweep over me.

"Krillin," I breathed, standing up slowly.

I observed him oddly for a moment, wondering what exactly was going through his mind. Another thought had ultimately dawned on me and I was currently mulling over the details of it. Without Vegeta, I wouldn't be half as strong as I was now, NOR would I be able to reach the status of Super Saiyan. Therefore, seeing me with bright white hair, I imagine Krillen would believe me when I confessed that we were two different people.

He was staring at me, perhaps contemplating this very thing in his own mind. I swept a few fingers through my limp bangs, revealing my silvery blue eyes that seemed to set him back a few more moments.

"Do you know who I am?" I asked him finally, keeping my voice low so as to not startle him. At this point, he was just gawking at me, prepared for some sort of attack or something. Very slowly it dawned on him, his head nodding numbly.

"Then you realize I'm not him," I stated the obvious, moving just a little closer to him. "And that you have nothing to fear in me."

He nodded again, looking away from my eyes (that apparently unnerved him) and clearing his throat.

"I don't really know what to think," He admitted. "You'd imagine that after ten years, the impossible wouldn't seem so impossible but it does. You're here, and I feel 'him' over there. Yet you're the same guy or at least you look that way. The other night," He shook his head. "you'll have to forgive Yamcha. He hasn't been on the good side of Kakarot in a while. You just scared us is all. But I knew," He looked up into my eyes, which might have been painful considering his size. "I knew you were different. I felt it. You aren't the same guy."

"No." I shook my head. "We're not."

I paused, gazing around me.

"Krillin," I breathed almost painfully. "What has happened here? I don't understand."

He lowered his head, eyes on the ground.

"Terrorists," He whispered the word like he hated it. "let loose a stream of rats, carrying the Ebola virus, right into a series of schools."

I blinked hard, not wanting to really listen but knowing I had to. Like being a cancer patient and realizing they're about to tell you that you're going to die; knowing you had to hear, but hating every second of it.

"Gohan caught it," He continued, sentences clipped. "gave it to ChiChi. And Goku... er..." He faltered. "Kakarot as he calls himself now, sat in that house with them for 16 days, more or less alone while they died. I guess it ruined him. Or whatever man he'd let himself be for so long. But let's not talk here." He glanced around. "Too many old ghosts."

It was an odd thing for such a logical man to say and I wondered suddenly what ten years of horrors had done to all of my friends. Who were dead? Who were alive? Who had gone insane? Who was tottering like Krillin was?

"Krillin," I asked before we took to the sky. "how did you know for sure it wasn't Kakarot when I came to the house? You just felt it?"

He nodded.

"That, and something else," He said, levitating now. "something you said."

"What was that?" I asked, now curious.

"You said the word "Vegeta"," he said. I was too astonished to even ask how he knew that name, rising with him into the sky.

"So?" I asked, flying next to him, careful to keep my power level as low as I could.

"So, it's a word I've heard him use before," He answered, being too cryptic for my frustration to handle.

"Krillin," I snapped, trying to keep calm. "Stop with the puzzles. I wake up in crazy land, get attacked by my friends, find out the whole world is basically enslaved by uhhh.. ME... I don't exactly need you holding shit back ok?"

He actually smiled, a sideways grin on his mouth appearing and then vanishing in a period of about .7 seconds.

"You used to say that name in your sleep," He said, faltering for a moment. "I mean, Kakarot did. Before all this." He shrugged. "He would be in deep sleep, thrashing around, screaming the word "Vegeta" over and over again. In the morning, I'd ask him about it and it seemed like he couldn't even remember having said it. Only, he was especially irritable about it, something that in those days, was rare. Like he hated me even saying the word or something."

I just blinked, not responding. I didn't want to. There was one more hilarious little detail to this "Soap Opera in Crazy Town" that I didn't want to reveal: the fact that all this, in more ways than one, was entirely my fault.

We arrived at the strange little home about a half hour later, the sun slightly setting in the sky. I had, against my will, taken into appreciation the sheer difference in the world that I had left and the one that Kakarot reigned now. The colors of the sky were more beautiful here, untainted by pollution or populated areas. Every bit of wild life I had seen on the way here had been running about carelessly, staring up at us in sheer curiosity, rather than fear of what monstrosities we would rained down upon them. This world was far more beautiful and improved than the one I came from, despite the price paid.

Yamcha was sitting inside, pointer finger still itching around the trigger of his massive gun, the barrel staring right at me despite Krillin's attempts to have him lower it. His beady black eyes were on me constantly, watching every movement I made. I slowly sat, my hands where he could see them, my cool stare meeting his.

"You know," I said casually, my pride getting the best of me. "I could crush that stupid thing before you even realized I moved. It really is pointless."

He shrugged, eyes never leaving mine.

"Yeah," He admitted. "But from past experience, I know you don't exactly like the feeling of hot metal in your chest. So for now, let's stick to the basics, like, why are you here?"

Krillin had taken a seat next to his friend, rolling his eyes.

"Oh geez Yamcha," he spat. "Give the whole 007 thing a rest eh?"

"Yeah," Yamcha was quick to hiss back, eyes blazing. "And the last time I did that, THIS mother fucker," he lifted the gun towards me, "slit my fucking throat! Or didn't you recall?"

Krillin just sighed, lifting his hands in a dramatic gesture. He looked at me, an apologetic grin on his mouth.

"We all tried to stop Kakarot," He explained, fingers curling over the wooden table-top. "When we realized what he was doing, we all tried our best to first talk him out of it and then..." He trailed off.

"And then all hell broke loose," Yamcha finished for him. "And YOU tried to kill us all. Fucking spun Krillin's destructo disk right at my throat you God damn PSYCHO!"

I closed my eyes, exasperated.

"Yamcha," I said simply. "I'm not him. So shut up."

He frowned, eyebrows together as he huffed, standing up and leaving the room much to my satisfaction.

"He always did listen to you," Krillin smiled slightly. "Despite everything, he still does."

"Tell me everything," I told him simply, moving my elbows over the table. "Tell me what happened."

"We tried to talk calmly to him," Krillin shrugged. "We spat out a thousand of the usuals, "they're in a better place now", "they're at peace", "you'll see them again". But it didn't work," He hung his head. "you can't heal a broken heart with words. You can't convince a person that time is going to erase the pain they're feeling. Everything that Kakarot thought he knew about life was destroyed. His basic 'faith in humanity' was crushed and he only knew that something horrible had happened and that he had the power to stop it.

"Sometimes I think life was so much easier when we had one big bad guy to focus on. With all humans seeing the ultimate evil, they stopped caring so much about the petty things. They had one united enemy and so they forgot petty squabbles amongst each other and banned together to stop that enemy.

"But once the big bads stopped coming, once the world was so-called 'at peace', it was worse than ever before. Kakarot gazed around himself with new eyes, without ignorance or naivety which, I'm sorry to say, but was something you guys always had to an extent. But imagine waking up from that one day and seeing a world where people unleashed evil on school kids just to make a point. Imagine gazing around you at a seemingly Godless world and knowing you had the power to stop all that.

"There is passion behind the man, I know that much. He sees a fantastical world created in time, where there isn't death and destruction. He sees this dreamlike state of mankind where people don't murder or rape or steal or any of the things that are, as I grow older and learn, basically what humans do. He wants to end all that. He wants to restore simplicity to the world, taking away our privileges of technology and restoring balance to creation.

"Medical resources are becoming nonexistent unless supervised by him. He saw a world where overpopulation was sucking away the price of human life. With so many medical ways to cure basic human sickness, people were living longer than they should have, reproducing longer than was natural. Children were having children and abandonment and abuse were prevalent everywhere he looked. So via Bulma, he created a means of making women sterile until the age of 18, to eradicate the problem of underage pregnancy.

"Women are given a shot at birth and remain unable to produce children until they are 18 years old, where another shot awakens their abilities to spawn. A massive blood search was conducted around year three, where everyone found with sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS, HIV, Herpes and anything else virtually incurable were tattooed, so as to extinguish the infected from the uninfected. Red symbols were placed directly on their hands and wrists, to show whether or not they were deemed "sick". And then, soldiers were dispersed, collecting the infected and shipping them away to the "Factories". Thus, sexually transmitted disease was, more or less, wiped out.

"He's a genius. A very sick, moral-less genius, but one either way. He does what he sees as necessary to improve human life, even if that means ending it."

"But what about Bulma!" I insisted, hating the fact that I agreed with some of what Kakarot had done. "Surely she wouldn't have such a part in all this. It doesn't make sense!"

The saddest look crossed Krillin's eyes his face drained from color. My heart started to beat hard as he stood up, walking towards the stove and putting on a kettle of water for tea. He just stood there, bent against the stove and watching the water spin in the pan. A thousand sadness-ess seemed to build in his eyes and he just gazed down, lost in them.

I watched him for a while, my patience running thin.

"It was about year five," He spoke solemnly, eyes still on the stove. "You two had only been married for about a year."

"Me and BULMA!" I exclaimed, nearly falling over the table. He glanced at me, a very cool smile on his mouth.

"Yeah," He nodded. "It was hard for the rest of us to understand. I mean, it was no secret that Bulma always loved you, always stayed single, always kept," He lowered his voice glancing to the side. "always kept Yamcha at such an arm's reach. Even with you married, it seemed like the only times I really saw her smile were when you'd come to visit. Maybe that's why she always complained so much when you DID visit that you didn't enough!" He chuckled slightly.

I was too overwhelmed to give him the satisfaction of a laugh.

"Finally," He continued in a melancholy voice. "after enough years had passed, after the initial wounds of his family's death had somewhat subsided, he married her. I think things were probably good for some time, Kakarot's absence from the fields a welcome break. He didn't "check up" on anything and though work quotas were virtually never met, he didn't seem to care. They spent their time together, dwelling in whatever castle suited them for the time and things seemed to be going alright. But know this," he looked at me seriously. "as much as Bulma loved him, he NEVER loved her."

I wanted to disagree with this, keeping my mouth shut forcefully. How did HE know?

"He was using her," He explained. "She couldn't love enough for both of them. Kakarot wanted the world, and as sometimes happens, once he had it, he needed more. He couldn't just control; he had to control with fear. They couldn't just bow... no, they had to tremble. It seemed like he looked all around the world and every face he saw was the man that killed his family. He hated so completely that he lost himself to it. She just couldn't love him that much.

"It wasn't until she visited a "Factory" that she became broken. She, like some of the populace, still had believed they were simple rest homes for the sick and elderly, places for the sexually transmitted disease victims to live and die together with others that would understand their pain. She didn't realize they were heavily guarded assembly lines for killing people efficiently. But when she saw..." He closed his eyes. "She realized that in every endeavor to help Kakarot, she'd been aiding in a million people's deaths. It killed her Goku; it completely destroyed her."

I bowed my head, my eyes hurting from staring so long. We sat for a moment in the silent contemplation of the past, my mind seeing what he described and his own, reliving the horrors again.

"I remember the night she saw it," He said finally. "I can't forget that look in her eyes. Like every good thing in the world had just died. She told me, and now that I think on it, it was an odd thing to say but she said to me, in a voice that hardly even sounded like hers, "Krillin. I can't see colors anymore." And then she went to face him. I just stood out there Goku. Like a fucking coward, I just listened to it. The way she screamed and sobbed, so horrified by the person she had fallen for.

" "I loved you," She just kept screaming. "God, I loved you more than the world."

"I didn't know what to make of it, hearing them go back and forth like I've never heard a man and woman scream. He just kept saying it was necessary. That he would have it. That he WOULD have perfection. I'd seen her running, my eyes scanning her movements while I held my heart in my throat, watching as she went to one of the main labs and attempted to burn the entire thing to the ground.

"What was probably 20 years of work she tried to completely consume in fire, screaming the words "I love you but you can't have perfection" over and over as she sobbed like a mad woman. And then,..." He looked away.

I goaded him onwards with my eyes, insisting that he finish.

"And then I was too late." He told me. "He killed her."

I flew back from the table, knocking over my chair in my haste.

"No," I breathed, shaking my head. "No."

He just shook his head, burying his face in his hands.

"I just watched Goku," He sighed. "As he crushed her skull. She kept screaming the whole time, even as brains and blood were falling down her face, spilling on her clothes. She just screamed. Goku," He looked up. "I don't know if he meant to kill her or not. What I do know... is this...

"When she died, so did any lingering humanity within Kakarot."

A knock sounded at the door, Krillin sighing testily as he stood up. The sun was completely down now, the candle lighting flickering and reflecting around the room. I gazed at Krillin, still standing from my ultimate shock at his story.

"Neighbor kids," He told me, shrugging. "One of them was over the other day when you gave us... quite a scare."

I smiled slightly, remembering the little girl shivering in Krillin's arms.

The smile faded when he opened the door, two glimmering, piercing eyes glaring at us from the shadows around a beautiful face. I was smashed against the wall, my head breaking through the clay, embedding my back and shoulders as I was pressed hard against it. Pressure was around my throat, an arm strangling me as I gazed up in horror and shock.

I blinked hard, veins protruding from my temples as I took him in, the blackness around his eyes apparent from heavy drug use, his mouth so close to mine. He breathed me in, a psychotic smile on his mouth as he rubbed the tip of his nose against the softness of my cheek.

"Well," Kakarot breathed sexually. "Hello gorgeous."


	10. Chapter 10

He didn't move, his cold, black eyes staring into my own at this uncomfortable closeness, a smile pasted over his mouth. He pulled back his arm, letting me breathe finally, letting me gasp in shock and surprise at this unwanted meeting. I don't know what I had planned, what time schedule I had figured on before the inevitable meeting, only knowing that this.. yeah, this wasn't it.

Every inch of my skin actually HURT when he looked at it, the nerves and censors tugging back from him, as though knowing that this meeting was anything but natural. Energy balled around us both, though against our wills, something in this closeness erupting with a Godless feeling. It just felt wrong, just unnatural. Like two magnets with opposite energy being placed near one another and fighting against it.

His hot breath burned my eyes, and I tore them away, gasping for air. Krillin and Yamcha (who had at some point clambered out of his room) were staring like two inanimate statues, eyes wide like saucers. It would have been comical if... well, ANYTHING about this meeting was comical.

"My my my," Kakarot was sighing lazily, eyes rolling around in his head as though he were on something. "Aren't you a sight."

He came even closer, causing me to back against the wall. I was completely unnerved by his behavior, wondering if this was why people always stared at me, as if having a 6th sense for something that ought not be in their world. His height, though perfectly my own of course, was an intimidation technique all its own, looming close to the ceiling as we slumped against the wall. Every inch of his skin was beautiful and I hold no vanity in saying that. He was entirely me and yet I was entirely fascinated by him. I'd never been so awestruck, except of course when beholding Vegeta in all his androgynous appeal, staring uncouthly at this monstrous creature that held his entire body against mine.

Everything about him screamed sex and I had to oddly wonder if my body did the same thing. I'd never even realized my own sexual appetite until Vegeta had awakened it, every pore of my body suddenly drawn to this ... this THING that resembled me. It was as though our sexual hormones were matching each other, awakening a very unearthly and primal need.

I coughed it away, tearing my eyes from his again. I didn't understand this sudden obsession and I sure as shit wasn't about to indulge in stupidity quite like I had with Vegeta. No, he'd definitely cured me of that little flaw.

"So tell me," He breathed again, his powerful chest smashed against mine as he explored every feature of my face with his eyes. "beautiful stranger. Why exactly do you look just like me?"

I cursed my luck, refusing to answer. I wasn't sure just how fucked up the plans of fate had already been, almost certain that explaining "ohh.. well, see, I wished away your one biggest ally because I was fucking him for a month and was stupid enough to tell my wife about it, who yeah, was actually ALIVE in that timeline.. uhh..." was not the best of ideas at the moment.

He smiled wider, his beautiful, burgundy lips upturned slightly in the gesture. God, I wanted to choke, he was so fucking beautiful it actually hurt. I felt my toes curl in my shoes just at the thought.

"You...look like me," He said, bending his face to the side and observing me. "You... smell like me." He breathed hot against my neck, taking in my scent until I nearly collapsed in this all encompassing horniness that just about set the thighs of my pants on fire.

My eyes widened in horror as I suddenly had his whole tongue on my face, running up sexually over my cheek. I winced as he licked over my eyebrow, leaning his face almost tiredly against mine.

"Hmmm..." He sighed again, forehead against mine as he closed his eyes. "You... taste like me."

"Good God," Yamcha was whispering, horrified at this explicit scene.

I swallowed hard, matching my eyes once more with Kakarot's.

"What an enigma you are," He smiled, eyes gleaming.

"Well what can I say," I smarted back, lifting my eyebrows. "I try."

He grinned, white teeth shimmering between parted lips.

"And don't I love you already for it," He laughed.

He pulled back, seemingly against his will, propping an arm behind me while turning to his guards.

"Bring him," He ordered them, two well armed men grabbing me around the wrists and yanking me forwards as he made his way calmly towards the door. I growled, tearing my arms back from them, seething.

"I can WALK on my own thank you." I snapped rudely, glaring at either guard that dared to touch me without permission.

Kakarot turned, the oddest expression of confusion on his face, like I had said something that virtually made no sense at all.

"No you can't." He said simply.

I widened my eyes at that, about to retort something snotty when blood shot into my eyes and pain nearly knocked me out. He'd pointed two fingers at me, exploding both my knee caps with his energy.

"FUCK!" I screamed, sinking down. Pain was a volcanic eruption around me, my entire body trembling as I coughed and hacked, trying to suck in air when all my body could sense was horror.

A loud bang pierced the sounds of my screaming, Yamcha's gun aimed at Kakarot as a bullet was let loose at his chest. It slowed in mid air, my torment slightly subsiding as Kakarot's palm was outstretched to meet it, the bullet spinning wildly in thin air as it came to a stop.

"Ah ah ah," Kakarot grinned, eyes dark as the bullet spun around and launched itself into Yamcha's throat.

Krillin was shrieking obscenities, blood spattered all over his face as he tried to hold Yamcha's body from the ground. Blood spurt over and over out of his esophagus, pumping out with every beat of his heart. His eyes held the look of shock, glazed over as they both collapsed in a heap on the floor.

"No," I whispered, gazing up at Kakarot in terror. "No."

The darkness took me.

I had the oddest sensation of floating. I was breathing fine, encased in my beautiful dreams that set me apart from the pain, yet I felt like I was floating. Waves of cool water licked over the features on my face and tiny bubbles tickled over my limp fingers. The temperature was perfect, warm yet cool as I remained in its formless embrace. I could feel the hairs on my head, rolling about in that erotic way that only hair can when its beneath water, mezmerizing to behold.

And then it dawned on me, so quaintly, that I WAS underwater.

My eyes bolted open, seeing the glassy surface inches above my face, tangled by my sudden movements. A piece of equipment was attached to my mouth and nose, helping me breathe as I stared upwards. Both of my arms and feet were locked by metal, holding me in a crucified pose beneath the surface. I struggled weakly against them, my knees so kindly reminding me of their position when I yanked upwards, nearly passing out again from it.

I'd been stripped down to my black briefs, my hair and eyes, oddly enough, still platinum colored. I gave myself a moment to breathe a sigh of relief for that, thankful that my state of unconsciousness hadn't been deep enough to lower my level.

I closed my eyes, trying to drown out the pain of my knees, reaching an odd state of meditation that Piccolo had so long ago shown me. In the back of my mind, I could decipher a conversation, far from where I presently lay incapacitated. Harsh voices sounded, becoming clearer the more I reached out for them, the sensation of a sobbing man making my eyes open again. Hushed cries were heard, something that sounded like pleading and I even felt the movement of the air from harsh gestures. The word "please" and "free" caught my attention, my body suddenly going cold when I heard the unmistakable voice of none other than me.

"You WILL work and you WILL give me what I want." I heard him say, listening closely. "Or so help me, I'll keep her forever. You think you know the pain she suffers? You cannot even BEGIN to imagine what eternity will inflict."

I cringed at the cruel level of his voice, unable to even recall a time when I had used such a slicing tone.

"I will disembowel her arms and legs from her body," he said in a sadistic voice. "I will cut her face until it resembles that of a human FAR less than it does even now. And I will keep her alive, dearest doctor." He whispered. "Far after you leave this world, I will keep her, a corpse haunting eternity, void of soul or mind. I can make her bleed and yet her heart will keep supplying until the day my thirst for it grows numb. Imagine how long that will take. You think you know pain worse than what I can give her? Give me time and I will make her world nothing more than a chaotic cess pool of torment. You will see the extent of my sadism, good doctor, and you will cry tears of BLOOD when you do!"

Every word was bruising, the subject of the matter a mystery. I listened as he went on, understanding now what Jessie had been trying to tell me. Yes, we were definitely two different people.

"And know this," He said in an even darker voice, causing me to strain my hearing. "it will be by YOUR hand that she suffers it. See my heart through my eyes and understand that I AM being merciful. You made the monster and she is MINE. Deliver perfection into my hand, make them bow willingly and I'll set her free. You will not stand in the way of my vision. You will not stop perfection. I'm going to show this world something it has never seen before. But you will do it and you will do it until I say it is done. Than she will be yours again."

I heard more hushed sobs, though I couldn't make out whether the tone was even man or woman, a soft scurry of feet in the opposite direction as me.

A movement above me cut my thinking, staring from my laying position as Kakarot levitated directly over me. He was smiling, (from what I could see, the surface still wavering slightly) eyes bold enough to pierce through the distance between us and leave me uneasy. We were now seemingly one person, standing before a glassy mirror.

An unprecedented sensation of calmness was able to overwhelm me and I wondered oddly enough, if he felt it too. It was the strangest concept, to behold oneself as an entirely different being and I began to understand that in our sociological differences, our instincts and perhaps reactions to things might be very much the same. The calmness took over and the briefest idea came to me: that I had spent so long trying to understand and even to hate this man and yet, in all the world, in all the dimensions and in all the times, I would NEVER find someone that could possibly understand me the way that he did.

He was my brother in even a closer sense than a relative can be, staring at me with a look of marvel.

Yes, I let the idea for just a moment take me, letting down my animosity (and even rage at him for blowing out my kneecaps), and sitting in the moment of understanding. That there were things about us that no one else would ever be able to grasp like we did. That there were feelings and pains and quirks and a thousand other things that not even identical twins could comprehend the way that we would.

And even sadder thought took me: He could love you the way that Vegeta never did.

I glanced away, letting the moment fade. No. I wouldn't be so desperate. I wouldn't let myself be so foolish again. A thousand teenagers made the mistake of falling in love and being broken and although it may have happened later in my life, it didn't change the fact that it was something necessary to learn from. I could hold anger forever at what Vegeta did but that didn't mean that I wouldn't fall down and pick myself back up again, weary of the thing that had stumbled me in the first place.

Besides, I had heard the words he had spoken and despite our similarities and despite my obsession with Vegeta, I had lain with evil far too much.

I watched Kakarot slowly extent his muscular arms outright, breaking beneath the dancing surface and pressing two buttons on either of my face. A metallic clank followed as my cheeks were released, my head going forward as I broke above the water. I glared at him, trying to decipher how precisely I would get my self loose, watching as the water slowly bobbed around me, sinking lower and lower as he drained it.

He seemed to sigh, rolling his eyes as he straddled me suddenly. I quit struggling with the devices, uneasy with his position over me, either one of his legs around me as I sat in the shallow pool. I felt the hot leather of his pants around my thighs, swallowing down any reaction that might have stirred. What an odd feeling, I almost laughed, to be so turned on by oneself. Certainly Narcissus would be jerking off in his grave at that one.

His fingers moved curiously around my cheeks as I breathed in fresh air, my eyes almost rolling into the back of my head in the delirious taste of it. I took about a second to observe my surroundings, as I sat in a shallow pool of slightly green tinted water. It was a man-made pond of some sort, a small bed of water surrounded by trees and birds and grass and the whole works, yet inside a great white hall. The trickling of a waterfall came from my right, butterflies dancing around in the sunlight that broke through holes in the roof.

It was, in a word, gorgeous.

He smiled softly at it, the drug-stained detached grin gone from his features. He seemed honestly pleased by my silent approval, watching my face intently as he delicately explored the contours. I suppose if anyone else in existence had done such a thing, I would have told them to renew their vaccinations but at the same time, I knew that what he was doing was something that I myself longed to do. To understand this incredible enigma before me.

"What an odd feeling this is," He mused, never leaving my lap. "To feel myself beneath my fingertips."

I let an awkward, half-grin, grace my lips. He moved so close it felt as though our skin was gliding off each other, his hands moving down to either side of my neck. He slowly let a finger cross over dip in my throat, grazing my collarbone. It was definitely sexual and I fought down frustration as I yanked slightly on my arms, still tightly held by the wrists.

"I understand what you are, you know," He whispered. "I felt you. I've known you were here since you came. I could sense it."

"I had meant to keep my power level as low as possible," I frowned. "I had thought it was. Guess I was wrong."

"No," He shook his head, that boyish smile still gracing his features. "It wasn't that kind of feeling."

With a clank of metal being retracted from my right wrist, he lifted my hand with his. I was suddenly struck with the awful dejavu that Vegeta had done damn near the exact same thing. Yet, instead of placing my hand beneath the water, he placed it over his chest, clad in another tight black sleeveless shirt. I felt the powerful muscles expanding with breath beneath my palm.

"Here," He told me quietly. "I felt you in here."

My eyebrows highered at that statement.

"I felt something akin to magic," He told me. "In a world such as this, I knew euphoria isn't something that comes without a stimulant and I was dizzy with you. I breathed you for hours, wondering if I was crazy. Do you feel it?"

He sensually moved his nose across my cheek, his lips trailing behind as he breathed over the tiny hairs on my face. I flushed with excitement, letting my head dangle back slightly as he left half kisses up my throat. I was surrendering and I didn't care.

"This rush," He breathed. "like my veins are on fire."

I nodded gently, letting out a pent up breath. His mouth slowly moved over mine, not kissing me but his lips touching my own.

"I feel like I could drink you," he whispered, skin touching mine. "And be thirsty forever."

We were both drunk on the moment, our auras and powers contrasting and combining until we were intoxicated with sexuality. It was a calm, primal state where conscience and thought were an abyss of forgotten. I felt his teeth on my chin, bending my head backwards.

"Nothing makes sense," He sighed, eyelashes on the softest part of my throat, his steaming breath making my skin moist. "But I don't need it to."

His fingers made lazy circles on my abdomen, tracing the harsh, jagged contours of my muscular structure, perfectly his own. I knew I was rock hard but there was no need for an apology. He knew, he understood. A wordless exchange of knowledge; he would never judge me, he would never hate me, he would never turn away as everyone else had. He was me and he could love just as capably as I had.

"I know every part of you that likes this," He laughed softly. "I know every portion of your body that you want me to touch. I know every muscle group and every sick little fantasy you've ever had. You never need to be sorry around me, you never need to worry what I'll think. Isn't that the strangest freedom you've ever had? I can't even grasp it."

He pulled back a little, releasing my other wrist and allowing me to sit upright, his weight still over me.

"So tell me," He smiled charmingly. "Why are you in my world? How does a miracle of miracles come about?"

"I'd rather talk to you about this world," I said, shaking my head and trying to blink away the sensations that pushed down on me from all sides. I had to clear my head of him. I had to make my position clear although, his CURRENT position wasn't exactly making that easy. I wanted to pop my head against a rock just to grasp the complete fuck-up that was this fate of our's. How precisely is one supposed to handle an impossible situation?

"Yes," I nodded my head. "I'd rather talk about your world as mine now seems of a little less importance."

"How did you come about being here?" He asked, completely ignoring me.

"I woke up," I said in a tight voice, not exactly caring whether he believed me or not. "Now don't change the subject. We have matters, you and, and I'm almost positive you know what I'm referring to."

He made a mock face of confusion and if I hadn't, well, you know, BEEN him, I might have been fooled by it.

"Let me up," I told him, pushing at his chest and driving down the crude scenarios my mind was flooding me with. "I won't talk with you this way."

He hesitated, staring darkly into my face. I was overcome with how crazy this moment truly was, wondering if I hadn't gone completely insane in the last few days. Oh, but wouldn't that just be hilarious. Vegeta waking up from his comma, bashing my head against whatever buildings/boulders/God knows whats, until I remained just a trembling half-wit in an insane asylum.

I looked into his eyes, seeing that markings of time were completely void in his skin. We never aged, even through horrors and hardships. We never showed the scars of what lay beneath and sometimes, like him, I found that to be a curse. The only difference, (besides the obvious hair and eye color), was the darkness around his lids, shaded with sleep depravation and drug-abuse. I glanced again at the markings over his pale arms, hoping he hadn't caught me. There were physical differences and I had to remind myself, that despite his intimidating presence, I WAS stronger than him.

He slowly moved downwards, running his face a little too close to a certain area, just to tease me. It was cruel I tell you. He clicked two buttons flashing over my ankles, releasing them and standing up, his own erection displayed unapologetically. I don't know why I was so off-put by it, it WAS my own body. Still, I averted my eyes, tenderly climbing to my feet.

I wouldn't let him see how horribly the pain in my knees still was, despite the healing abilities of the pool. He gazed at me softly, sitting back against a rock and gesturing for me to speak.

"This world," I began, searching for my words. "It's completely unlike mine. In fact, despite how we look and despite this seeming "miracle of miracles", I shouldn't be here. Somehow, I've toyed with fate and have ended up or maybe even created this place. But things aren't as they should be." I looked into his eyes, wondering if I was being point-blank enough. "YOU shouldn't be as you are."

"And prey tell," He leaned back further, an amused grin on his face. "how precisely should I be?"

"Like ..." I caught my words, almost falling into his trap. He would have loved to hear me say the words 'like me'. Instead, I kept silent, glaring at him.

"Tell me about your world," He finally spoke, rolling his eyes. "Tell me about the differences."

I sorted my words, wondering how I would avoid the obvious.

"Well," I let my mouth glide to the side slightly, deep in my concentration. "All of my friends are still alive. The earth is as it was, I suppose here, ten years or so back. There are still cities and cars and freedom," I spat the word a little venomously. "I'm as I am now. The world is ... better."

"Better?" He peevishly cut me off, sitting up. "And I suppose you would know all about that pretty world, wouldn't you? Sure. You've seen every part right? Been to the worst cities, smelt the sickness of the air, watched every life around you. Or am I wrong," He paced. "And you've been doing the same exact thing I was doing 15 years ago? Nothing."

"That's not fair," I countered, being cut off again.

"Ahhh yes," He looked up with a cold smile on his features. "Fairness. In your pea-sized world of black and white, good and bad, you know ALL about justice and fairness. Just like I did. Only, I never saw a thing until 15 years ago. You haven't looked through my eyes nor watched what I have watched. We may have the same bodies and similar minds, I sense that well enough. But we are not the same man and this world is not the one you left. So leave your little tid-bits of fairness back there."

"I know what you're talking about," I told him solemnly. "You're speaking about Gohan and ChiChi. I get that."

"Ohhh... you do, do you?" He spat in an inferior voice. "You just know everything about that huh? Watching your family shit out their own intestines, your wife barfing up pieces of her innards as they melted inside her. Sure. But you didn't watch them die, did you?"

I was struck with silence.

"No," He shook his head. "I would see it on you if you had. I would see the stains of watching something like that. But you think that's the only culprit for our differences and you're wrong. We aren't so fickle as to be destroyed by that. You sense it within yourself. We loved them but we wouldn't fall to pieces without them."

I kept silent still, contemplating his words.

"Alright then," I nodded finally. "So I don't understand. I don't grasp the full sense of it. If that didn't make you what you are, if that didn't put a contradiction between us, what did?"

He sat again, crossing his arms with a scowl. He didn't meet my eyes, watching the pool instead as it refilled with fluid.

"I wasn't so different from you," He began, voice calmer now. "I played my role of good guy, beating out the bad guy. I played the father and the husband, the mannequin of a human male. I stood in my tiny world and saw the black and white of my surrounding species. The good people that came to church when ChiChi forced me and the bad guys that kidnapped and held small business for ransom. But I never saw more than that. My innocence, my primal creature prying beneath the flesh, wouldn't let me. You feel it too, I know. The encompassing monster beneath that longs for the unnatural. Only I kept it at bay, at one time. I didn't let myself see a world that I could allow myself to hate enough to change.

"So I walked amongst them with tunnel vision as to what they really were. You obviously know what happened, some good soul obviously unleashed the horrific telling of my 16 days with death. So quaint that is. At least I can refrain from that little bother of a tale. But it wasn't until afterwards that the change within me took place. I wasn't given the commodity of my little world anymore. I couldn't walk around people and see wholesomeness within them. They weren't good or bad, saintly or evil anymore. You haven't even seen evil. You cannot even understand the complexity of it.

"I walked in a world that I'd never been before and it was chaotic. What sort of man, to make a political statement for his country, unleashes something like Ebola on school kids? Hm? What kind of creature could do such a thing for no real reason? So I decided to explore. It was my only means of comprehending the useless deaths I'd witnessed. You see, I had no outlet such as revenge. They found the bastards in Triphilim City, natives apparently, not hours after the virus was released, more or less putting them down after a massive stand-off."

Triphilim City, I thought for a second, trying not to miss his words. Why did that sound so familiar?

"So I decided to explore," He continued, eyes never meeting my own. "I went into the deepest slums of the worst cities, walking around in the streets at the worst times, watching the world transform as I looked onwards. Everything I'd ever thought I understood was spat upon, as I saw rapes all around me, killings, shoot-outs, robberies. I let myself binge in bars with the worst men I've ever met, hearing their glamorized tales of mass murder, their choked cries at the end of the night as they drunkenly relaid stories of burning children meant to testify in courts.

"At the darkest time, I watched in drug-induced fascination as seven men brutally raped a 6 year old girl, beating her to pieces as they did it." His eyes took on a haunted, glazed look. "She just kept saying "I'm sorry, I'm sorry", like she had forced them to do it. Like she was somehow responsible for their cruelty. They just raped her for hours, laughing as they took turns. Afterwards, as I lay my head against the table, watching onwards, they beat her to death with belts, until I could hear the sickening flick of blood flying in the air and her squeals go silent. You're thinking right now that I should have saved her, I know because 15 years ago, I would be thinking the exact same thing. But I'm not God. We're not Gods. We don't control fate and we haven't the right to save every single stupid soul in this world because it suits our situation and our self perception.

"I watched as they numbly cut her body into pieces and stuffed the bloody hunks in an old refrigerator, arms around each other as they laughed and zipped their zippers, walking clumsily upstairs.

"I guess I thought for a long time that in order to come to terms with the purposeless death of my family, that I would have to face the element that had caused it. But I was wrong. I only began to understand that evil. I saw the world around me, in all its vastness, and I understood that I wasn't just sent here by some computer that randomly chose planets. I realized that in everything else I'd lost faith in, fate was one thing that I couldn't dismiss. I was sent here to free them in the last way they could possibly grasp; to enslave them, to make them see the error of a wasteful life.

"I befriended the coldest fiends I could, latching onto their ideals of power and greed. Evil once sat at a desk, smoking the most expensive cigar I've ever seen, and told me that fear is the only means of power. That fear could buy you more power than any amount of strength or money in this God forsaken world. And I came to understand he was right.

"I looked on, seeing the many shortcomings of humanity. Their legal justice system was an absolute joke, money buying freedom for monsters and condemning the innocent for charges incomparable to those that the rich were freed from. I saw a world where women spawned and then abandoned children to dumpsters; where men fled like cowards after realizing the consequences of loose living. I saw magazines that promoted lavish lifestyles that the average human could NEVER afford, women reading these useless pieces of garbage and tossing away thousands on plastic surgery.

"I saw a system of vanity run by gay men that HATE the female body, women walking on runways, looking like holocaust victims with their boyish bodies. And I saw the vanity in EVERY woman when she hated herself after seeing these things.

"I suppose I could sum it up by saying I saw the every day pettiness of life. I saw the uselessness of animals going extinct for the price of a fur coat. I saw the wastefulness of polluted oceans and garbage covered beaches. I understood my place in the world was to change it. You've seen the horrors of what I've done, you've heard the tales of everything I've learned. But you cannot grasp where you stand now. The way that just EVERYTHING is better."

"You might have used the dragon balls," I told him rudely. "You might have asked the dragon to help."

"They don't exist anymore," He shook his head. "After Radditz was destroyed, the earth was filled with more chaos then ever. They didn't have the one big bad to scare them into unity."

My eyes opened widely and I turned away. Triphilim City. It had been the first place destroyed by Nappa in the wake of his and Vegeta's arrival. I felt nauseous suddenly.

"We wished and we wished and we wished," He continued, oblivious to me. "We wished until we realized that the dragon's concept of "natural human death" was becoming altered. Mass destruction WAS natural for a human life. Disease, famine, violence. That was part of humanity itself, as history has shown. The dragon became tainted, bringing back people half-alive, half-dead, wandering around horrifically. We even sent out a ship to Namek, bringing back its youngest member, a means of hope that the dragon's power could be restored. It wasn't."

I contemplated this silently, swallowing my guilt down and burying it deep within myself. There was no going back now. There was nothing that I could do to take back the wish and what was done was done. Feeling sick with guilt wouldn't take it back.

"So..." I swallowed again. "What about these "factories" hm? Ending someone's life before its time is murder, or weren't you aware?"

He rolled his eyes, positioning himself more comfortably against the rock.

"So you'd rather let the human population continue to soar with their vast amounts of medical help, a woman able to conceive and birth a child LONG after it is natural for her to do so? You'd rather let sick people's lives continue on and on, treating the ailments but ignoring the inevitable? Or would YOU rather linger on until death, a ghost in a world where no one needs you, where everyone and everything you've ever loved is gone and people around you are just waiting for you to die? Is it better to live in pain and sickness, your organs shutting down one by one, your family's memories of you tainted by the burden of changing your shit covered diapers and bedpans?

"Rather, I give them the chance to bid their family goodbye and the power over death itself. They don't have to fear it. They accept it without the burden of fear regarding whether or not it will be prolonged or painful. It's a quick stab of a needle and they drift to sleep. If you believe in reincarnation, than I'm merely speeding the process along, sparing them misery."

"Fine." I said, crossing my arms. "Then what about all those people you killed? Sure, you say fear is a necessity of control, but what about spreading ebola to all those countries simply because they wouldn't bow to your command? Will you stop at nothing for power?"

"What countries did I destroy, Goku?" He stood away from the rock, circling me like prey. "Useful countries? Flourishing cultures? No. I destroyed countries founded only by hatred and jealousy for a life they aren't worthy to live. Places where the price of a human life is less than cattle, woman viewed as property of abusive, cruel men. They lived in poverty because they were too insolent to widen their horizons and see the value of those around them, yet they blamed ANYONE but themselves for their conditions.

"I destroyed countries that mutilated their women's genitals for their own sick, selfish pleasure. Countries that strapped explosive weapons to the chests of their own fucking children, just to end the lives of their enemies. I destroyed countries where their only resources were spent created weapons to unleash monstrosities upon those they deemed as unworthy of life. And understand, I feel absolutely no guilt regarding it. Yes, my ideals are radical but that doesn't mean they aren't logical."

"Logic." I spat arrogantly, standing upright and gazing at him. I was tired of his scrutiny, his ability to undermine even the most basic morals seemingly to justify his sadistic need for devastation. "Tell me than, Kakarot. When your logic fails you, which it inevitably does for us all, when justification falls short of expectation, what happens?"

I moved up to him, silently congratulating myself for actually catching him unaware.

"What I mean is," I continued. "What happens when you start to feel again?"

He was silent, jaw tight as he remained staring at me.

"Logic seems at times to be the void of emotional eccentricity." I reasoned. "When you don't want to feel, when you don't want to believe in something greater than yourself, than logic will always be a commodity; then numbness will always give you the justification you need for your actions. But what if they fail? What if you start to feel again?"

I moved towards him, wearily holding his wrist up.

"Or is it," I smoothed my finger over the jagged marks that tore up his arms. "that you already know the touch of a conscience you've so obviously tried to silence?"


	11. Chapter 11

He looked at me hard, watching my fingers trace fresh lines that his accelerated healing hadn't covered yet, bruises a deep red and yellow that stretched over brilliant white skin. Pierce lines had swelled bluish colors and I touched over them tenderly, feeling the raised flesh beneath my own. He was showing me a kindness by letting me touch him this way, a very slight vulnerability that allowed me to come closer than he'd probably let anyone in a very long time.

He looked deeply into me, accepting the moment and even accepting his own inability to answer my question. Perhaps there was no answer at all. He used because I would use if I had seen the things he'd seen. In my lifetime, I had always been overrun with the curiosity or more appropriately, fascination with human weaknesses. What was so powerful that it could make people resort to damn near anything just to have it in their life? What beautiful world awaited someone at the very peak of drug induced intoxication?

I'd never used myself but than again, he was as right about me as I was about him. I'd never seen the earth through the eyes of someone that had truly seen the horrors it could supply. I WAS naive in some ways. I'd seen the big bad evils tarnish lives in a blink but I'd never watched men enact the terrors that he had witnessed. I realized that if I had, I would probably never be able to sleep again or even think coherently.

Maybe the harshest lesson I was learning in those moments was that I had been blessed. I'd been so shallow to think that when my little reputation, (however pathetically fake it had always been), had been a tad stained by an admitted mistake, that the world as I knew it wasn't as it should be. That once hero Goku wasn't so-called perfect, that the whole world was just completely out-of-wack and needed to be fixed. Christ, I think I felt like the most selfish person in those moments.

"What about Bulma," I finally sighed, letting his arm fall. "Why did you have to kill her?"

His face tightened and maybe if I hadn't been him, I never would have noticed at all. He turned from me, perhaps knowing that despite his stoic features to the outside world, I could trace every contour of his face and tell you exactly what it meant.

"She loved you, you know," I told his back, looking downwards. "We've always known that."

He shrugged slightly, trying to will away emotion the same way that I always did.

"She didn't love the man we'd become," He answered honestly. "She saw who we really were---who we became after so long---and it scared her stupid."

He turned to look at me again, his expression very dark suddenly.

"She tried to stop inevitability." He said in a cold tone. "She tried to destroy everything I'd worked so hard for. She would have stolen the thousands of lives that will soon be saved by my vision. The same with Piccolo and all the others that tried to stop me. They see the means but they don't realize the results. Don't you see?"

He moved closer to me, staring so hard at my face that I felt almost compelled to look away, my willpower keeping me steady.

"No one can stop me," He whispered in a hissing voice. "I will kill anyone that stands in my way."

He looked over me, letting the words sink in.

"Anyone."

I stood up a little straighter, not liking his intimidating stance over me. Ohhhhhh no. I did NOT like that. In fact, it reminded me very instantaneously of Vegeta and I just glared him straight in the eye, leaning forward with my teeth grit.

"I can stop you," I told him point blank. "I think we both know that."

He blinked, backing off a bit. I think he was probably a little bit impressed by the sudden spring in my attitude, never having seen this side of himself before the great change.

"What would you be stopping?" He cocked his head to the side finally. "Do you even know?"

I paused for a while, mulling over what he was trying to say exactly.

"Come with me," he finally sighed. "Walk a bit beside me, if you can."

We both glanced at my knees and I moved one step forwards.

"They hurt," I admitted, glaring at him a tad for emphasis. "in fact, they feel downright strange. Why did you do that anyways?"

"Felt like the thing to do," He shrugged. "I needed to know where you stood in the way of things. I needed to know if you were a threat or not."

"And you decided?" I raised my eyebrow.

He thought about it for a moment, helping me to walk a tad until I gained enough balance to proceed mostly on my own.

"You're right that you could stop me," He said after a bit. "Or more specifically, that physically, you could beat me."

I nodded, glad for this revelation.

"But it doesn't really mean you would win," He looked over towards me, gaining another raised eyebrow. "You have something to lose, Goku. How can you destroy a man that cares for nothing? You value your life, I see that in your eyes. Me? I'd fight to the death and love every minute of it."

I remained in quiet contemplation, unable to meet his eyes as I mulled over the truth in that. It was a very negative comment but more than anything, I believed him. Despite the coldness and even the points when I would gaze at his face and see something akin to very obtuse madness, there was always a bit of desperation. Indeed, despite his love for the ideas of a paradise on earth, he seemed to have no real dispute with death.

"Enough talk of somber things," He waved his hand, leading me out of the great room. "I want to show you my world. I want to show you the utopia I have created and I want you to understand everything before you try to stop it."

He led me through corridors of white paint and marble floors, gold fixtures holding up candles and illuminating various paintings of him, created by many different artists in many different styles. How positively vain, I almost laughed allowed, before accepting the fact that I was staring for ridiculous periods of time at every one and wishing I actually had more time to do so. Truly, we were totally in love with ourself. No society to condemn our self obsessive tendencies, it was exactly what I would do; immortalize myself in paint.

It also brought to light a very acute understanding that I really felt no shame in being so abrasively turned-on by him. We'd always been obsessed with mirrors and reflections; it would make perfect sense that I constantly caught myself admiring him.

We came to an enormous room, dwarfing even the regenerating place I had awoken in. A large four poster bed was encircled by various cloths, green and silver and sheer that wrapped around the room. Everything was chrome and green, leaves and vines crawling up silver walls, sunlight shining down in great rays from the windows in the ceiling. A waterfall trickled in the corner, caught in a large pool that beamed with glittering fish that danced beneath the surface, frogs leaping from Lilly-pads onto gleaming stones. The pool was extended outwards into lines, tiny streams that went all over the room's floor.

I stood still for a bit, just gazing around at the paintings that were directly on the walls, indicating many interpretations of paradise, lakes and seas painted so real that I reached out to touch them, amazed by all of it. Yes, this was his room. I could feel it. I knew it because of any room in all the world, it was the one that I would have created.

He had touched a hidden button behind a vast array of bluish silver flowers, a hidden door sliding open. Grabbing some clothes, he tossed them at me, adding a half-grinned "hope they're your size", before watching me unapologetically. I hadn't even realized that I was more or less strutting around his palace in just my boxers, of course, never having been one to worry so much about my own nakedness. Human insecurities and obsession with hiding their natural state had always been something of an illogical mystery to me.

I pulled on the shirt he had thrown, a gorgeous, tight fitting white tank top that mirrored his own black version. He smiled as I rolled my eyes, his obvious pleasure in making us two different versions of the same person; the black and the white. My smile was quickly replaced by a pained expression as I grimaced, my knees roaring with agony as I tried to pull down my briefs.

I almost fell to the floor in the waves of nausea I was experiencing, not even realizing he was standing next to me, holding me tightly until I toppled forward and found my face pressed into his neck. I trembled at the pain, color fading from my face as he slowly led me down onto the bed, a concerned look on his features. I panted beneath him, holding him tight to my chest as I just rocked back and forth from conscience state of pain and oblivion. I was so close to passing out, hardly hearing him when he coached me to "just breathe, just breathe" as he lay over me.

His hands were on my back, sliding as best they could, sandwiched between me and bedspread. My eyes were closed yet I took a moment to focus more on the pleasure of closeness than the pain, loving the feel of cold satin from the bed and his hot body laying perched between my legs. The sensation of blinding pain and pleasure suddenly caught me before I fell from the precipice of consciousness, my eyes drifting open.

He was staring down at me, watching every inch of my skin as it paled and then flushed back with color, my eyes dilated then reverting back to normal. He pulled one of his hands from my back, letting his fingers sift through my hair as he made a "shh"ing noise, calming me. Perhaps he knew precisely how to comfort me, doing exactly what he would want someone to do to him in such a state of agony. His lips washed over my skin in calming, chaste kisses, letting my breathing go normal as he tenderly touched his mouth over my eyelids and forehead, nuzzling the side of my face.

"You ok?" He finally asked, hand still gliding through my hair. I nodded, swallowing when I realized that I, for some odd reason, didn't want the moment to end. Yes, the pain was excruciating but the closeness, the soft press of his bare arms around mine and the heat and weight of his muscular body over me was in a word, wonderful. I knew that extracting my hold on him was long pass due but I only gripped him tighter, my fingers in the back of his hair as I just breathed for a second longer.

And then my eyes bolted open as I was ball sack-kicked with the realization that this was so comforting because it was what I had done with Vegeta so often. Oh, but what a lovely, cringe-worthy Apocolypse that was. I'm surprised I had enough self control to even restrain myself from punching the poor oblivious schmuck right off of me, his face a look of pure confusion at my sudden animosity.

He slowly crawled off, bending down to hold up a pair of gorgeous black pants, also very similar to his own. Tenderly, he lifted my foot, sliding one pant-leg over, than the other as he let the smooth material glide upwards, along with his hands. He was kneeling over me, taking special care of my knees as he dressed me. The heat from his palms and the weight of his finger tips as they inched upwards excited me and I fought it down, refusing to catch his imploring gaze as he shamelessly took in every inch of my exposed body.

My cock tightened in my briefs and as much as I realized I truly ought to be ashamed of the fact, at the same time, I recalled his words. He knew exactly how I felt. He knew precisely how I would respond. And in that fact, I would never have to be ashamed or apologize. I would never look at myself and think that I was stupid so why would he?

I leaned upwards as he pulled the pants over my lower section, sliding them over my hips but leaving them unbuttoned as he stared at me. To my shock, he slowly traced the outline of my erected cock beneath my briefs, his touch so light it was as though someone was just slightly blowing over tiny spaces of it. I caught my breath, gawking as he did this strange thing. It almost wasn't even sexual as he touched it, his eyes never looking up as he was just fascinated by me.

"So much alike," He whispered. He glanced up at me, fingers still around my length. "My God, we're so beautiful."

My breath hitched as he suddenly leaned forward and kissed me on the mouth, nothing chaste or reserved about it. I crawled backwards, my eyes wide as I tried to escape him, his body only moving closer as he inched over me. My head suddenly was against the headboard and a mass of green satin pillows, his tongue now pushed into my mouth. I struggled, not understanding this.

Yes, every single inch of my body (yes yes, giggle, every inch, snort snort) was screaming that I wanted this. But at the same time, every powerful part of my body was warring against another.

---Sexually? I was tearing his clothes off in my mind and beating his insides with every throbbing bit of my cock.

---Emotionally? My heart was inching its foot up my ass for being ignorant as to fall so quickly for another; especially since I had always claimed to love Vegeta.

---Mentally? I was wondering what kind of vaccination could cure this amazing breed of stupidity.

I let myself bow to him for a moment, silencing the war within me. I needed this. I did. I needed just a second where I wasn't beating myself up for all the bad decisions. I needed a moment to enjoy someone besides Vegeta, to feel beautiful within the arms of someone that genuinely just found me compelling. I needed to make a memory that I wouldn't see as tainted later because I found it was a lie. I just needed so many things that he gave me for a minute.

I held the back of his head, lacing my fingers in his hair as he was doing to me. We battled with each other's mouths, kissing exactly how we loved to be kissed, touching with no apologies exactly where we knew the other liked to be touched. Even the force with which we teased each other was non-experimental, never shy or curious so much as exactly how we both wanted it.

He pumped my cock furiously, moving his hand quickly into my briefs and yanking it upwards. I gasped against his mouth, pushing harder against him as he jerked me off. We rocked in-tune with each other, his thumb moving in circles over the tip of my erection. I trembled as I held him tight to me, grasping the thickness of his own hardness, feeling how he must have been fascinated by mine. We were exactly the same size, which I suppose shouldn't have surprised me, yet it did.

I violently tore at his zipper, ripping it downwards and letting my hand dive into the heat of his cock. He moaned in approval, pushing against me as we held each other. We were both aggressive, my only hindrance in that case being my knees, causing me to allow his dominance for the time being. For some reason, and it's an odd thing to admit, but the sex was somewhat void in this act. We weren't doing this because we planned any sort of relationship in the future. We weren't even doing this for selfish reasons, or for the momentary release we knew we'd soon achieve.

It was as though we were silently agreeing that this was necessary. We needed to understand each other on every level, on the ultimate to the somewhat mundane. We needed to grasp the finality and the depth to which we were alike. Even in the most intimate of details, we mirrored each other and in this, we were both given the revelation that indeed, we could understand the other in ways that not a single person in all the universes could.

We panted in hushed breaths, our eyes locked and our lips parted as we watched each other during the final moments. Our erections swelled to painful extents, the hardness like massaging flesh covered granite. Precum leaked over my knuckles, pooling on my lower abdomen. I stared at it, my rapid breaths knocking my vision up and down as I looked at the beautiful beads, his promise that everything I was feeling and experiencing was exactly like his own. His promise that as terrific as I was feeling, he was feeling that way too.

Our chests convulsed with violent breathing, veins appearing in both our foreheads as we reached the end of this experiment. In unison, both our heads were thrown back, sounds identical to one another ripping from our throats. I hadn't even realized I sounded like that or that I so often threw my head backwards in a climax, taking about .5 seconds to dwell on the fact. We attacked each other with a quick, vicious embrace, shaking slightly against each other as we road the waves of our exploration, our hearts pounding the same rhythm and our panting coming out at the same time. Without a word, we both touched the cum that lay over us from the other, raising it to our mouths in the sickest, most sexual moment of our experiment. Our eyes closed and we collapsed in the sensation of tasting someone else and that someone else being entirely us.

No explanation needed.

When we had both finally quieted, our breathing becoming normal once more, he lifted his head from the crook of my shoulder, kissing me deeply once more. I let him, sinking into the calm after the storm, loving the fact that the pain had been so forgotten that the sting of its intensity was like a bad dream, more or less never having existed at all.

"You ought to be a doctor," I whispered, not even sure if he'd heard me until we both burst into laughter, letting out every last bit of tension as we rolled with it.

"Yeah," he chuckled. "I would have loved to see Mrs. Steinsin handle that little demonstration of masturbation in Sex ED."

It was the kind of stupid humor I appreciated and we both rolled onto our backs, gazing up at a mirror covered ceiling as we went with it.

We lay there for a while, staring up at the reflections of two men who looked like the reflections of each other. The good and the bad Goku, I thought for a second. We nonchalantly buttoned our pants, still gazing upwards at the unusual spectacle.

"I don't know why I did that," He admitted, letting his face roll over to gaze at the side of mine. "It just dawned on me that I needed it. That WE needed it."

I finally let my head roll to the side, facing him.

"We did." I nodded, admitting it to him even when I hadn't planned to.

We stared once more at the other's face, wondering silently how often we did this when the other wasn't looking. I looked downwards, watching as both our fingers coiled around the other's, holding hands for just a second because it was what our bodies told us instinctively to do. Everything was instinctive and very rarely mental and I found myself being more primal around him than I had been even with Vegeta at times. Not violent, mind you, the way that Vegeta and I had always been; just more based on what my body told me was natural to do and how naturally to react.

"There is so much I don't know about you," He whispered, moving a tad closer. We locked eyes. "There are things I can feel that you keep from me, hidden away; your secrets possibly even more dark than mine. Only," He paused, blinking. "the things I have done I don't hide like you do. I don't feel shame in the cruelties I have caused and I don't feel the obligation to hide myself from you. Because I am you. And you are me."

I nodded, feeling the tension build in the air.

"So tell me," He breathed, tracing my face with his fingertips. "beautiful stranger. How long do you intend to keep your secrets from yourself?"


	12. Chapter 12

"Stay with me," He said suddenly, leaning up. "Stay with me, for a few weeks."

I made an awkward face, having not the faintest idea what I could possibly answer to that. It seemed the universe as I knew it was now one big chaotic puzzle and every piece was bent, lost or broken. I had been so sure that my perception of Kakarot was so cut and dry, the bad guy so obvious in this world as it had been in mine. But where was my beautiful black and white? Why was it suddenly feeling like I'd dove face first into an abyss of gray?

"The Sabbath begins tomorrow," He said, seeing my hesitance in this particular argument. I cocked an eyebrow at that, gesturing for him to explain. "16 days," He spoke in a solemn voice. "16 days to remember, to enjoy, to see the beauty we have all worked so hard to create."

I let him have his silence for the moment, wondering the significance of all this. And then it dawned on me, Krillin's familiar words coming to mind.

'Kakarot as he calls himself now, sat in that house with them for 16 days, more or less alone while they died. I guess it ruined him. Or whatever man he'd let himself be for so long.'

16 days huh? I understood the symbolism now, the need he had for this. 16 days they spent celebrating freedom, 16 days they spent loving and cherishing every minute they had to live and love with those they cared about. They would appreciate these 16 days more than any day of any time of the year and it was his gift to them. 16 days would always be precious.

I took a moment to weigh my options, my loyalty towards those that suffered Kakarot's reign slowly dwindling as I more and more came to attach myself to him.

"Fine," I nodded, watching his face light up. "Show me your world, show me what you've done. I want to see it all."

"And see it you shall," He smiled sweetly, though there was a wickedness to it. "Every last inch."

The days went by with a bliss I had only experienced once or twice in my lifetime. Days spent lazily, lounging about in the sun, drinking more than I have altogether in my existence. Kakarot was true to his word, showing me the means to which the earth now sustained itself.

No job was useless, none spent lost in the claustrophobia of a four foot cubical. Every person on the face of the earth had an ultimate purpose and hand in correcting the damage that had been done. Automobiles as they had once ruled were now selected only for those who's job description called for their use, and, of course, Kakarot himself was certain to have full access to anything his heart desired.

He showed me the ocean like I'd never seen an ocean before. I saw whales and creatures I'd never even heard of before, diving carefree beneath the depths of the surface, dolphins shrieking out their calls without fear. We stood over the great beaches and took in the complexity as though every detail was a simplicity, knowing that virtually, we had forever. These would never dry up, these would never be condemned to beer bottles, cigarette butts and plastic cans. I tell you beauty had never caught me so awestruck and silent as it did in those first few days and I would silently look over towards him, an unspoken gratitude in my eyes for his kindness, for his showing me these things I hadn't appreciated before.

And then, in the hardest of times, I would gaze across the expanse of the sea, seeing the sun kiss waves like stars glittering in the heavens and I would wish just for one moment that Vegeta could see all this; that it could be him standing beside me as we saw beauty that human words would never do justice. Those days were my most silent and in my ultimate sadness, Kakarot was as far from understanding me as ever.

Sometimes he would stare curiously into my pale eyes, remarking how strange it was that we were the same being yet two different universes would switch up our coloring so dramatically. I didn't want to tell him that as much as my coloring was an attempt to keep my power on alert, all the same, it was my physical need to visually separate us that spurned it the most.

"They look sad," he told me on the third day, cocking his head side to side as he took me in. "Your eyes I mean."

I glanced up at him, squinting in embarrassment.

"Yeah," He remarked softly. "Maybe it's just the coloring or I'm truly crazy. But they look distant, sad or something." He shrugged. "Guess maybe mine would look the same if I dyed my hair platinum."

Strange things would occur to me at even stranger times. I would watch his interaction with servants (he was actually more congenial than you might imagine) and I would think to myself that I felt absolutely no guilt over having explored myself sexually with him. I would stare at the beauty he possessed and I would recall the immaculate features of the prince and I didn't feel guilty. Was that justification? Was that my bringing up my anger at Vegeta and subduing it with Kakarot? Did I tell myself Vegeta deserved it when I honestly realized he probably wouldn't care regardless?

Busier days were a blessing and I felt my gratitude hit their ultimate high when a day's time would go by without the faintest thought of Vegeta. Yes, idleness was a curse when the only person you thought of was the one person in existence that probably hated you above any other.

We would lie in the quiet contemplation of the other, shirtless beneath a summer sun, fresh, cold drinks at our sides as we held our eyes shut. It seemed that everything in childhood that we'd taken for granted, we were reliving together. 16 days where the world rejoiced in its freedom and Kakarot and I would sunbathe for the better part of each afternoon. Such an odd idea. In showing me the world, he was just showing me my favorite past-times because he knew that they were his own. It gave him a power over me that made me smirk. Truly, he did know how to please me in every way.

Sexually, we were off limits to each other at the beginning of days, silently agreeing that the time for loose hormones and things of that nature were on a definite waiting period. Chemically, it was there and there was no real denying that. Every day it was like suffering a self inflicted horniness that only spurned massive stupidity. And he knew it. Hell, we both knew it. We would glance at each other almost shyly, grinning like complete assholes as we read each other's sexually depraved fantasies. I figured I must have been the most narcissistic psychopath for wanting to fuck myself so completely at damn near every ticking second of the clock.

I think we even teased each other, if there is such a thing as flirtatiously teasing yourself, as he would smile almost sadistically at me, climbing from his spacious pool and catching my obvious appreciation of him. I would let my eyes so unapologetically gaze down his bare torso, taking in every glimmering drop of water that reflected the sunlight like tears, tasting his salty flesh as they ventured downwards. Yes, to only be a drop of water in those moments!

I would even laugh at him, as I would spill alcohol (of which there seemed to be no end to) down the collar of my shirt, lifting the base to catch them and revealing the perfect abs underneath. I would grin wickedly as I caught him staring, his eyes rolling as he read my mind. 'Yes,' he'd nod wordlessly, 'I was staring.'

Still, I began to wonder where all of this would lead. We'd been intimidate, though we were giving each other a break at the moment, and that did mean something. I'd never been the type to wander nor to indulge in sexual escapades that didn't have a very real goal towards the end. So yes, maybe I had let loose from time to time as a teenager, perhaps even unknown to my friends and certainly unknown to ChiChi (as we hadn't married at that time) and let myself "sleep around" a bit. I hadn't been quite so innocent as everyone swore I must have been, meeting strangers and to a degree becoming involved.

But what did that mean for us? Was he the same way? Was intimacy reserved for those you wanted to include in future plans? Or had time so separated us that he saw me as nothing more than a means for sexual experimentation?

And then THAT of course would kick me in the shaft as I realized just how truly damaged I was. I had no faith in anything anymore, not even myself. I saw a man, the one man, that I most certainly COULD relate to and when I gazed into his flawless beauty, I was certain that he was none other than Vegeta himself. I had been used and humiliated, mocked and fucked and torn to pieces like a twelve-toed hooker. Did that hinder my trust in Kakarot? That he was beautiful as Vegeta had been beautiful and that inherited my distrust of him?

I'd fallen for a devil with an angel face and perhaps this break we silently held was a direct response to that. I couldn't trust anyone.

I realized many times, as we would explore caves and mountains together, that I was still living in my world. I'd leapt into this one and had so willingly accepted its flaws that now that I saw the truth, I couldn't let myself be here anymore. I just kept expecting that any day, I'd wake up and be back where I virtually wasn't wanted. My life routine was thrown off so much that even though everything in my past was bleak and stained, I wanted it back just because I could understand it. Now that I could grasp that there WAS something between us, I couldn't force myself to live it. Because it wasn't natural, it wasn't possible where I came from.

And please believe, between us, I kept thinking that Vegeta would be there. The constant in my life, friend, foe, lover or other, was gone now and I would cling to his memory, hugging the pillows of my bed tight.

Kakarot had been most gracious in this aspect, my reign of his home as free as his own, allowing me to choose whichever room I wanted to inhabit. I had wandered the castle for a while, clicking open doors to find reds and golds and every other colored room one could imagine. In the end though, I had decided upon a dark blue interior, the walls a shinning orange that oddly enough, didn't clash as horribly as one might expect. Kakarot had just nodded, not even hearing my decision on the matter.

He'd known I would choose that one.

As the days went by, our paradise and my own heaven of ignorance began to fade and I began to glimpse pieces of Kakarot that I hadn't been willing to see until they damn near peed in my face. Though he would take me to my room at night, whispering his farewells for a wonderful day, I knew he stayed up later than I. At the earliest hours of the morning I would feel his energy, as I had the first time ever seeing him, fluctuating dangerously. Track marks didn't fade in his finding me and the circles of black beneath the lids of his eyes only grew more intense.

He was the ultimate insomniac and though he called our meeting the "impossible miracle", the drugs hadn't ceased. Was I really expecting such? True, at that point, I'd never seen him use, in fact, didn't really even mention them. They were a simple fact that I'd grown to overlook, trying to will away memory and common sense as we spent the light hours rejoicing in our discovery of the other. But apparently, that wasn't enough.

My questions regarding Kakarot's intimacy issues were answered by the 9th day, as I so curiously couldn't sleep and sought him out. Though I was always in my transformed state, I had managed to keep my level low enough (through many hours of practice) to that which might resemble a steroid-induced human. I silently crept through hallways, a maze it seemed, seeking out his rapidly expanding and shrinking power level. It seemed to quiver at times and then rise at others and I cocked an eyebrow, following it.

The scent of sweat and immense heat raised to my nostrils and I nearly turned back, hearing noises that weren't exactly hard to decipher. Groans and sighs and gasps met my hearing, what sounded like a hundred people prying away at each other behind two large doors. Light crept between and underneath the frame, hitched breaths and sucking sounds making me step lightly.

Oh, I'd heard of orgies and as predictable as can be, I'd been often curious about the sheer mechanics myself but the idea of actually engaging in one? It was positively out of the question.

Yet even in the moment, my body began to react and I cursed being a male not for the first time. I was thankful for the leather bound pants that held me down, hearing the material creak as I moved forward, shirtless, through the doors. As the light expanded over the smooth planes of my chest, I took in sights that I hadn't figured in a thousand years I would ever come in contact with.

Hundreds of humans stacked up in the enormous hall, almost every one of them naked and gleaming with perspiration. Men and woman matched each other's breathing as they pummeled each others bodies mercilessly while watching other pairs doing the same thing. Women wore strap-ons, yanking the hair of MEN as they dove beneath the fleshy shields of the masculine body, a very warped thing to behold for someone as seemingly virginal as I felt at the moment.

Men and women were strapped to walls with barbed wire cords, screaming in ecstasy and pain as leather wrapped dominatrix's lashed over their bleeding skin with whips and chains and every other sort of flagellating tool imaginable. Sounds of vibrating dildos smacking against wet skin caught my attention and I gasped, seeing men dressed as women and women sporting masculine ties and cuffs as they poured into the other's body. Women grinned up at me from the mask of another woman's vagina, their tongues clicking over soft areas that made me instantaneously rock hard.

Just when I was certain the dreaded "blue balls" had caught me, I glanced over to see two men, their masculine bodies wet in the dull lighting, tearing at each other's clothes with absolute madness. Their human skin was interesting to behold, the seeming "flaws" making their appearance only that much more admirable as they kissed each exposed layer of mortal flesh they could get their lips around. I suddenly ached with the desire to join them, to show them the inhumane aspects that could make sex even more than the modern mind could fathom.

I wanted to levitate their bare bodies in the air, to fuck them over ceilings and pummel their skin into sky, to wrap my arms and rock against them as we tore through clouds and stared at glittering heavens. I was almost doubled-over with the desire, catching myself as my body tried to take me in that direction. Their beautiful tanned bodies and blonde hair thrust upwards, their throats exposed as their mouths lapped at the other's mouth; it was positively breath-taking.

My ascent towards them was stalled, however, when at the very base of everything, on a sort of stage even, I caught a glimpse of pale, white skin clashing with black features. Dark, drug stained eyes caught mine, rims and lids so red that they appeared to almost be bleeding. Clotted blood vessels stained yellowed eyes, the black pupil catching my own. My breath caught before I could release it, held within as I stared at Kakarot. His chest was wet with sweat, beads climbing down walls of muscle as he pitched his lower torso against the back side of a human male, causing a gasp and groan from the weaker being.

He stared at me and I realized how ugly this suddenly was, the entire hall filled with drug addicts and sexually deprived mortals enacting their sick fetishes with each other. He banged inside of the human, his hand grasping the hip until redness and blueness swelled the fragile skin, his other embedded in ebony locks of short hair. Still his eyes locked with my own as if saying that though he was with another, he was fucking me raw with each detached thrust.

Syringes and smoking pipes met my eyes as I tore them from his own, gazing around in understanding that made me ill. I hadn't seen the ugliness before. I suppose horniness had perpetually blinded me to it. Cocaine stained nostrils flared and the clatter of needles hitting concrete floor made me all but ill as I took it all in. I made a face, seeing a girl laying unconscious on the floor, double-teamed by men as blood leaked out of her nose.

Kakarot was oblivious to everything, his face still turned towards mine as he lifted his bottom half inside of the human, small bits of blood leaking from between quivering thighs. I realized that he probably didn't even recognize me, just a beautiful, half naked thing that had interrupted his party and caught his attention.

I scoffed as he stared long and hard at me, hurrying his thrusts as he neared the conclusion of his immorality, blood-shot gaze never leaving the beautiful figment that was me from his mind. I snorted in contempt, turning to leave him to it, hearing the nearness of his hitched-breaths, the hurried gasps that resembled my own to a nauseating identicalness.

I wondered quite instantly, that since he was me in every aspect, had I endured the circumstances he had, did that mean entirely that I was capable of everything he had done? I didn't want to think about the insane probability, leaving the room in a storm of irritation. What sickened me most I guess, was when I turned for one last peek, seeing that the man he drove inside of, had jet-black hair and a very pronounced widow's peak.

Yes, he was mourning Vegeta. He just didn't know it.

Days after, we spoke nothing of it and I silently wondered if he even remembered. Maybe it was best that he didn't, considering the lengths he went to in order to conceal his rampant drug addiction from me. I would see the flesh of his arms and cheeks shiver in moments of withdrawal, his hand in mine trembling at the end of the day. Cold sweat would bead on his forehead and his farewells were hushed and quick, his footsteps over the tile tremendously fast as he would leave me in my solitude.

Whispers of his latest sexual conquests would reach my ears from the servants, tales of up to one hundred persons having been with him in one night. His stamina was apparently unmatched and his appetite for the sadistic and grotesque legendary in itself. Rumors of torture chambers for the masochistic pierced my curiosity and I fought myself on more than one occasion to deny it. Perhaps I fought a growing animosity towards him NOT for the sick world he dove into every night but for the sheer hatred it caused towards myself. I knew that he gave himself the freedom to indulge in absolutely everything that I secretly had always wanted to, only insisting that I was man enough to fight the urge and overcome it.

He didn't follow any of the rules I told myself as a man I had to live by and maybe because of that, I was jealous of him.

Days came and went where I would ignore him entirely, wandering the world alone for once. They were the hardest of any days as I would let my mind wander to times with Vegeta. I would stare across fields, wheat kissed with the last rays of sunlight as oranges and reds and pinks reached over the expanse of the sky and I would think, "I wish Vegeta could see this." I would touch the surface of the sea with my fingertips, the temperature just right as the beautiful salty water would wade over the pads of my skin and I would think "I'll bet Vegeta would love to feel this." And then? Even the fresh spray of salty water against my cheeks would feel ugly.

One night, I escaped the castle, keeping my power level low as melancholy thoughts poisoned my mood. I soared through cold air, feeling nothing of its sting against my soft flesh and I thought crudely how obvious it was that in so many ways, I'd never be free of Vegeta. I'd nearly freed his soul from his body the last time I had seen him yet in so many aspects, he owned every bit of me.

I was mourning and in that, I wasn't getting over him.

I let myself fall from the sky, watching the stars glide away from me as I dropped to the earth. Gray clouds stretched lazily over the full moon and wind tore my hair upwards over my eyes as I collided with the surface of a large lake. I let myself fall through the water, the millions of bubbles I'd created dancing with moonlight as they surrounded me before ascending to the surface.

I sighed the air out of my lungs, feeling them beg for more and groan as I denied them for a moment. I let myself fall into a state of unconsciousness, drifting between this world and the next, the lands of harsh reality and a dreamlike state where every mistake I made could be forgotten in euphoria. I wanted to cry so often these days that I didn't know how to feel when I WASN'T mourning. The times when Kakarot would make me laugh or make me forget, it was like I felt so ashamed!

Like I was being fickle for getting over my sadness; tainting the memory of everything Vegeta had made me feel.

I awoke from my dreamlike state, finding that I'd drifted to the surface on my own and now bobbed like a corpse as I stared at the sky. Even when I breathed the much needed air, I reasoned in my heart, I was still drowning. I blinked out water from my eyes, nearly inhaling the entire lake as I realized that Kakarot was yawning right next to me, levitating over the surface and stretching his arms out.

"What are you doing here?" I demanded non-too-kindly, eyes flashing dangerously at him for interrupting my crappy mood.

"Admiring you," He breathed sweetly, tracing the tips of his fingers over the top of the water. "My Ophelia Immortal."

"Ophelia?" I asked, having heard the name somewhere. He smiled weakly at me, apparently exhausted.

"Killed herself," he said simply. "torn between family and the man she loved. Sometimes, when we keep secrets and are devious, even in the name of goodness, we're doomed in the end."

"You're speaking in riddles," I sighed, closing my eyes and enjoying the tranquilty of the lake.

"You're keeping secrets," He said bluntly, my eyes opening slightly. "How long until you tire of this incessant masquerade Goku? How long until you're willing to open up to me, even just a little bit? Will this lake be dry by then?"

I looked over towards him, wanting to roll my eyes, wanting to diminish the seriousness of this conversation. But I knew I couldn't. He was right. I kept myself so far from him, so much in another life that I couldn't even begin to accept that I needed to live this one. Vegeta wasn't coming and I wasn't going back. Kakarot honestly seemed to give a shit about me, was fascinated by every psychological aspect about me. We could share this world together if only one of us would give in.

But I turned away.

"Always the mystery," He breathed tiredly. "Always five worlds away Goku. How can we be the same person yet I look into your eyes and I have no idea what you're thinking? I want to be close with you," He touched the side of my cheek as an after thought. "I want to share so much with you. But you won't let me near."

He looked away, anger on his features.

"You're cold." He said simply. "Your heart is cold."

With that he left, the water spraying upwards as he tore over it, leaving me to my loneliness and isolation.

That night I had found him, surprisingly hidden in the shadows of his own room, the satin bedspread covering his chest as he stared up through the darkness. I could see tiny bits of moonlight seeping through the skylight, illuminating the shinny whites of his eyes. He seemed lost in a world of his own, perhaps in a drug-induced comatose state or not.

I took a moment to admire him, wondering how often he did this with me. The shape of his face, the slight pout of his dark lips; no wonder so many humans had always summed me up in one word: fascinating. He didn't seem to acknowledge my presence at all, gazing up at the stars as though he wanted to be there; anywhere but the place he found himself.

I moved to the edge of the bed, creeping silently like a feline through shadows as I approached him. I fingered the silky coldness of his satin sheets, waiting for him to notice me.

"I don't understand why you're so cold," He whispered, making me stock still. "It seems that even when I have you here, you're so far from me. I swore all my life that I was missing something, that something or someone vital to my existence was gone and that ultimately, I had to find them. I thought it was just childlike fantasy spawned from loneliness but as I grew older, the feeling only progressed. Like a big part of something that more or less defined me was missing. And now I have you, the other side of my soul as ironic as anything fate has thrown my way. But you're still gone."

I listened to him, guilt welling within me.

"I thought the day that I found you that all the problems in the world rested in the secrets you held within yourself," He continued, voice low and troubled. "Maybe I relied too much on you. But I realize now, nothing has changed. I still feel as alone as I have always felt, as isolated from everything as I always have. I don't find the answers in your eyes like I thought I would and I don't feel the warmth and completion that I had expected."

"Maybe I'm not the person you were missing," I said quietly, eyes lowered.

"I want to believe you are," he spoke honestly. "I want to believe that I wasn't set upon this world only to feel alone for the remainder of my time. I want to believe that fate isn't that cruel and of all the things I have lost faith in, fate is something that I firmly grasp to. But I feel like I frighten you or like..." He paused. "You're sickened by what you see in me because you see them in yourself. I make you realize that everything you've ever desired is personified in me and it scares you."

I gazed at him, unsure of what I was about to do, only going with my instincts as I crawled towards him over the bed. It seemed I was drawn towards the heat that radiated from his body, captured by his pain because it reflected mine. We were fallen angels together, having seen the gates of heaven and now, together, falling from grace. If we shared nothing else, we shared agony.

I crawled over his body, straddling him as I cupped his face with my hands, kissing him chastely.

"If I'm so cold," I whispered, forehead pressed against his. "Than by all means, melt me."


	13. Chapter 13

We had sex.

No. We had a LOT of sex.

For three days total, we spent our hours drinking away the moments with each other. Showering in sweat and saliva, it seemed I spent three days entirely on fire until I virtually burned myself out. The world was our mattress and the very skies and oceans the cool silk sheets that held us. We panted our seconds away, our lips touching every inch of moist flesh beneath them. I would throw my head back in the bliss of every tick of the clock, his mouth grinding into my exposed throat.

Days passed like hours where we would neither eat or sleep, totally soaked in the essence of each other. The meaning of the phrase "two become one" became painfully clear to me and I mourned in the moments that thought would return and I would see the face over or beneath me as the last person I was thinking of. In the flurry of my emotional release I would gaze down into his eyes and fold my hands over his throat, wanting to choke the life from his body, to affirm within myself that there truly was ONLY one of us worthy of existence.

Other times I would bite him painfully, hearing him hitch his breath in surprise and perhaps even anger at my unprecedented roughness. But I hated him you see. I hated that I'd succumb to this, this selfish male with the conquest only to fulfill his own sexual experiments via 'himself' of all people. I felt like I was suddenly the man that cared and was passionate about nothing; save for the thrill of the moment. I couldn't live my life like that. Loving, feeling, thinking NOTHING but what my body told me it liked.

And between us, as I would stare into his beautiful mouth, panting over my forehead, I knew that it wasn't Vegeta's and I wanted to kill him for it.

But know that I loved it as much as I want to pretend that I didn't. I hate being so human, to acknowledge how amazing it felt, how lost I became in it. Yes, I suppose that's a perfect way to put it. I lost myself to it, the euphoria of shattering orgasms and the scent of him all over me. I liked knowing that we were both fallen angels of what we'd once been, of the man so long ago that cared for things enough to fight for them.

We looked back in our moments and thought of the days when ChiChi had been enough for us, to times with our son and to times with friend's spent in the simplest summer days. We looked back to the selfless man we'd once been who would have thrown up in seeing what we'd both become. Truly, we'd betrayed our own memory of who we'd once been. But it was ok. Because we were doing it together and because as far as I had fallen, I looked into his lustful, drug stained eyes and knew he'd crashed further than me.

The sex was terrific, obscenely so. In fact, if there is a way to say that sex is perfection, our sex was its personification. There was no awkwardness to it, nor the quizzical doubt of whether or not the other party would like what we were doing. We knew exactly where to touch, where to kiss the other and what pressure to use in exactly the right places. But in that, there was also a lot of underlining sourness. There wasn't the usual exploration of the other's body, the triumph in finding places that the other person didn't even realize was a weakness. We needed only to listen to the rapid breathing or the cuts in pants to know exactly what we'd accomplished and I found quite honestly, that without even the smallest traces of love seeding the ordeal, it was actually quite empty.

It was lust and when you'd known at one point what real love was, the passion fired up and simmered so quickly.

Apparently, Kakarot knew the same, the drugs never ceasing their adventures beneath his skin, his countenance sometimes painfully unkind.

Eventually, sex became a sadistic outlet for pent up fetishes, working out on each other the violent tendencies of our bloodlines. He would choke me as we both came; I would tear gashes in the flesh of his back. We would even cut each other with ki tipped fingertips, drinking blood like animals. And as often as I could recall losing myself in sex with Vegeta, it had never been so withdrawn as the moments when would tear our teeth into veins, gorging ourselves on lust and sadism.

By the fourth day, I woke up alone, squeaking back the facet of hot water as I took a shower. I felt shame. I really felt dirty and sick with myself, letting the water cascade over broken wounds and festering gashes, washing away the illness of what we'd done. I felt for a moment that maybe I understood what a prostitute must feel after the first time she sells herself, signing away every moral she'd been taught in life for dollar bills that could NEVER EVER pay for what she'd lost on sweat-stained bedsheets.

I sank to the bottom of the tub, my face between my knees as I swallowed. Water pooled on my forehead, dripping down around my eyes. I watched them fall to the porcelain floor, resembling teardrops I wouldn't allow myself. The hot steam rose around me, losing me in a world I didn't think I'd ever understand.

God, how much I missed Vegeta.

I buried my face between my palms, covering my eyes as I let myself see him again. He sat, as always, amongst the most beautiful of memories, sinking beneath the heat of natural hot springs. His black eyes were dashed by shadows, appearing mysterious and even a bit wicked as he smirked, like he knew so many things I never would. Like behind beauty there rested everything about myself I'd never known.

I looked up, bringing my hands slowly down my throat, marred by painfully deep teeth marks. I just stared up at the ceiling, feeling so nauseous suddenly.

I thought for an instant that maybe if I'd just taken a few more minutes before diving into this new world, I might have instead, wished for Vegeta to love me, truly love me. But then I also knew that such a wish would have become jaded, just as this one had. Wishes made through selfishness would never be what they were intended for. And as I saw it, I'd gotten precisely what I'd asked for.

I would never, ever see him again.

As I walked from the shower, a towel wrapped around my waist, a young, green haired boy sat on my bed, playing with an action figure. I glanced around, wondering if there was anyone else in the room or if he'd somehow lost his way.

"Umm..." I started, getting his attention. "Hey kiddo. Can I help you?"

His eyes darted up to mine, a very brilliant turquoise color.

"Mr. Kakarot said you would read this to me." He held out a book with fairytale looking cartoon drawings on the front. His voice was very childlike, almost feminine, and he was probably less than 5 years of age. "He's too busy today."

I squinted, looking at the book and wondering just what would keep Kakarot so occupied. And more so, what the purpose of this child was, in a world where there wasn't a meaningless job to be found.

"What's your name?" I asked, pulling on a black robe and sitting next to him on the bed.

"Roman," He answered, looking up at my features and pausing for a second. I closed my eyes, allowing him the moment it usually took for humans to grasp all of my unnatural features. From the flawless, smooth skin to the brilliant, inhuman radiance of my eye color, it often took people by surprise, being in such closeness to me. Roman though, got over it quickly, confusion masking his face.

"Are you really old?" He asked me, looking suddenly so adorable I felt the oddest urge to hug him.

"Why?" I laughed, rolling my eyes.

"Because your hair!" He giggled, brave enough to touch the ends on one side. "It's so white!"

I smiled, always forgetting the entire loss of pigment that the transformation caused. My hair was so silvery white and my eyes so furiously pale blue, it was a constant blessing to rarely be confused with Kakarot. I instantly liked little Roman, gesturing for him to hand me the book.

"You know Kakarot huh?" I said mildly, looking through pages of the fairytale story book. "What do you think of him?"

"Mr. Kakarot?" He made a silly face. "He's a hero. He saved me."

"How do you mean?" I asked, honestly confused.

"My mom," He said quietly. "got hit by a car when I was still in her belly. Back when cars were on the streets hurting people. Mr. Kakarot found her and saved me. She died but I'm ok and Mr. Kakarot lets me stay here."

It dawned on me suddenly, the whys of a thousand things. Why did he kill older people off when they seemingly had so much purpose left in the world? I knew suddenly.

To destroy their memory. To destroy the human's history. A generation born to slavery would hear tales only of a life before where children were raped and killed just from walking outside. They would hear radical stories of the worst crimes against humanity and be lead to believe that they were common place in those times. Like little Roman, cars and trucks and automobiles of all sorts would be seen as technological monsters, the number of souls lost to their tyranny no doubt exaggerated with time. Would they even realize that they were slaves? Would 14 hours a day become leisurely and the human ability to adapt be stretched until nothing was seemingly out of the ordinary?

He was a genius. He destroyed their past and showed them only glimpses of a paradise that he'd created with their help.

I shook my head, amazed that I would even let myself marvel at what he'd done, what he was still doing. No wonder the bastard flooded his system with drugs; to numb the necessary evils.

"We're here," Little Roman told me, pointing to a page about half way through the book. A picture of a cartoon woman, carrying a tiara on her brow and sporting a very frilly, pink dress shown, locked high in a tower and shackled to a wall. How morbid children's books could be, I had to humor myself, shuffling through a few pages. "The beautiful princess has just been kidnapped by the evil dragon and he's stolen her voice."

"Why did he steal her voice?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Because in all the kingdom, the princess has the most beautiful voice of anybody." He told me as if I were completely stupid. "And her voice is so pretty that when she sings, the villagers are at peace. But without her song, they're afraid."

I sighed, wondering at how simplistic children's books were. Were adults so afraid of lost innocence that they wrote books to hold on to whatever last scraps of ignorance they could?

About a half hour later, we lifted the last page of the book, the picture somewhat grotesque. The green scaled dragon had sunk to the ground, blood spilling from its sharp fangs, a sword in its back from a great knight that had finished it off.

"The Princess sang," I read the caption. "and her voice was so beautiful that the dragon's evil powers were cut off and he fell to the ground dead. For nothing so evil could withstand the goodness of her voice."

I closed the book, smiling down at my little companion. In a lot of ways, he reminded me of my own son, perhaps the reason Kakarot had obviously found him appealing enough to keep him in the castle. There was a lot of innocence in the boy, a very real idolism he looked up at people with. And trust. Trust was something even Gohan had little of, even from a young age, demonstrated so hurtfully on the day I'd told him the truth of Vegeta and me.

Yet, I would never see that same look in the eyes of Roman. I knew that and I knew very instantaneously that I adored him. In all his admiration, I wanted to see myself through his eyes. Something flawless, something kind and something heroic.

"Oh!" The young boy squirmed suddenly, brilliant eyes shinning. "I have to go outside! My baseball lesson is almost started! Thank you mister!"

"Goku," I told him with a lopsided grin, sad to see his company go. "My name is Goku."

"Hm," He said, tiny features moving with wonderment. "Mr. Kakarot said that was his name, a long long time ago."

He shrugged just as quickly as the revelation hit him, waving as he scampered out the door, the light clacking of his shoes on the marble quickly dissipating.

Yes, I nodded for no one to see. A VERY long long time ago.

I dressed myself with numbness, with none of the fascination I'd temporarily let myself have for this world. I felt like I'd sunk into quick sand and very slowly was being devoured by it. Everytime I breathed, it was like every bit of it was just in vain and wasted on preserving a pointless life. Everything that had been painted so long ago was ugly gray again, even brown at the edges and I sighed for the millionth time, seeing no beauty in this world or even in the one that had been mine so long ago.

The contorting of air molecules silenced my depressing thoughts, the very slight swoosh of material sounding throughout the air, so light that even with hypersensitive hearing, I had to wince to catch it. Slow, almost inhumanely slow, something moved outside the door. As if someone had turned everything into slow motion, I could pick up the traces of air moving along the jagged edges of cotton pants, the thighs of whoever it was, very gradually brushing the material against itself. Yet I heard no breath, no beating where a heart should have pulsated.

Only the strangest sound came, like water moving in a vacuum hose or something. A very thick draining sound came, with an odd slapping of wetness against marble and I strained as the screeching of uneven fingernails seemed to scratch along the door frame.

I caught my breath to hear better, a strange wheezing coming from underneath the crack of the door, not breathing, but a very hissing sound as though someone where trying to speak but could not.

I stood, sensing that the presence had ceased all movement, both of us agonizing over what to do next. I moved forward, sensing the thing move backwards. With great speed, I went towards the door, viciously yanking at the knob and nearly tearing it from its hinges.

Nothing met my endeavors except the speedy clapping of rapid footsteps over smooth concrete, far away. I raced after them, my curiosity growing along with an unreasonable dread. Something didn't feel right, in this masquerade of a world, and my heart was pounding against the inside of my ribcage, beating much faster than my running demanded. Everything just felt wrong and I wrapped myself around corners, gaining on the thing.

The running footsteps were coming closer and as I wound into a new hallway, I felt myself go entirely numb, nearly falling as I caught sight of something I'd never anticipated seeing.

Pale, blue hair.

"B..." I stumbled, coming to a halt. "Bulma?"

The intruder stopped, turning the right side of its face towards me.

It was her.

The saddest eye I'd ever seen met my gaze and I was so lost in this predicament that I didn't even stop her when she turned another corner, glancing back once more with the side of her face, staring at me hard with the most sorrowful look I'd ever seen.

I didn't bother to follow, having the sense only to flee the mansion, to try to clear my chaotic thoughts as I sped through the sky. As much as nothing had really made sense, whatever marginally had, was now completely fucked up. Bulma was supposed to be dead, yet I'd seen her, hadn't I?

I swooped down to a familiar spot, clutching muddy, old papers in my hand, a diary of a man once named Goku. I knew, without needing any real proof of such, that my answer lay within him and the only truth I'd ever found, despite my time with Kakarot, lay within the papers I held in my palm.

So I took them and I flew with the insane thoughts coursing like raging rapids through my brain. And for no apparent reason, I found a cave and I stashed them within, laying against the cool, hard rock and gazing up at nothing in particular at all, but a thousand more questions than I'd had the day before.

All of them centered around the blue hair and the man that had called himself Goku, a long, long time ago.


	14. Chapter 14

"But Krillin I'm NOT crazy!" I hollered, hating how positively cowardice that man had become, slinking around his pathetic living establishment and watching the years go by. Oh yes, by God, Krillin was good at watching. "She is ALIVE and I saw her!"

His eyes looked tired, though from what I knew, the sabbath was still in full swing.

"I saw her die myself Goku," He rubbed his palms over his eyes, looking much older than I'd ever recalled him looking. "She was dead."

I growled, marching within the tiny expanse of his home, Yamcha's gun following my movements. How ridiculous. You can imagine, I was surprised to find the human still alive, apparently incapable of kicking it when he ought to, now watching every one of my movements like I was some sort of poisonous serpent. Sensu beans had brought him back, the lesson still learned as he winced at my every step.

"The dragon then!" I snapped my fingers. "He said that it began to bring people back wrong. Maybe that's what happened. He wished her back."

Krillin just sunk his head, shaking it in dismay.

"He would never have wished her back Goku," He sighed. "He's fucking evil."

"He's not evil," I said in a very soft, scoffing voice, mostly to myself as I gazed up.

"No," Yamcha said seriously, addressing me like a child. "He IS. And if you weren't so busy being psycho's cabana boy, you might have seen it."

I scowled at him, crossing my arms and being sure to throw in just the slightest amount of intimidation. He sulked, looking like he wanted to roll his eyes and instead, just glaring at me.

"The very real truth is," Krillin looked up at me. "is that you really don't know him at all Goku. Don't be so arrogant as to think that just because you're both the same person, that time hasn't completely altered that. Goku," He swallowed. "He knows YOU. He lived in your shoes for most of his life, he went through every feeling, every reaction, every gesture, every everything. But Goku, you DON'T know him. You haven't seen what he's seen or done what he's done. He knows PRECISELY how to behave around you, how to gain your trust, how to make you do anything he wants.

"But don't make the mistake of seeing yourself in him. That part is LONG ago and its only more apparent to me that you're entirely out of your element, ESPECIALLY if you think that bastard would EVER have wished her back."

"Then who?" I snapped, turning on him. "Who would have brought her back? Her father maybe? Kakarot told me that the dragon balls had begun to bring things back and before that I..." I lowered my head. "I heard a conversation between him and Dr. Briefs I think. I think Dr. Briefs maybe brought her to life wrong or something."

"What in hell are you talking about?" Yamcha groaned, adjusting his hold on the trigger. "No one has made a wish in years. No one can."

"But Kakarot told me that after his family died-.."

"After his family died, Kakarot did shit," He spat detestably. "He ruined the world. He didn't try to save it or even save them with the dragon balls."

"What?" I felt my eyebrows lower, glancing to Krillin. "He didn't... make a wish? He didn't even try to?"

The both just stared at me like I was a mute, screaming at the top of my lungs to an unhearing audience.

"He told me the dragon balls became jaded, wishing people back half dead, half alive. He told me they were of no use any longer and that no one had used them in ages." I told them.

Yamcha smiled, a very humorless grin, renewing my dislike of him.

"The dragon balls never became jaded," He told me, sounding everything out like I was too insolent to hear them as they were. "People never came back zombies or whatever. But it is true, that no one has used them in ages."

I glanced to Krillin, demanding a reason for this.

"No one has used them," He sighed, his head resting on his palm. "Because no one can find them."

I left in a state of more confusion than ever, finding that this seemed to be a constant in my life, if nothing else was. I just flew for a while, reflecting on the complete absurd shit stain that had become my existence. I let myself sum up the last month as spent in a void of logic. I'd made a fucking stupid wish, creating a really fucked up world, met myself in the worst fucking state I could have EVER imagined, and now, I was flying around like a fucking IDIOT, with no clue about what to do except sum things up with the F-word. Oh lord, if only things could be routine, just one more time, and feeling like a dumbass wouldn't be the only thing I could count on as a constant.

So this is what I knew, and I began to make a mental note of it, planning to write it all down later so as the facts didn't get messed up. I knew that I'd met myself, and that self, was basically everything incarnate that I'd never allowed myself to be: evil, hollow, conniving, SECRETIVE, sexually promiscuous and illogically violent. Good. Now that that was solved, what the FUCK WAS GOING ON!

I scowled, huffing angrily. I'd never really pretended to know all the answers but the plan hadn't exactly been to get more questions in the meantime.

I knew only a few things and that was that Bulma was alive, after being told she was dead, the dragon balls still existed, after being told they were corrupt and evil, and the two people I had adulterized myself for, were not at all the people I thought they were.

Good, now wasn't I just looking like the poster boy for the mentally challenged...

I flew to my cave, reflecting on everything. My one special spot away from the world that I constantly was growing to hate, my one place away from everything and everyone I didn't understand. And I began to write, as Kakarot had once began to write, hoping the futility of his gesture wouldn't somehow become mine.

And that, is where my story really begins. Because I'm still writing and I still have no idea what's going on.

I know he's still out there, and I know he searches for me. I feel him in everything, in the times when I'm angry, in the times where I get frustrated enough to want to kill, and that reminds me that in all my stewing and dwelling in the confines of darkness, I'm no further now than when I first arrived here.

So I made a wish to a dragon to never see him again and I met a monster. And that monster... is me.

I can feel his frustration and anger, because it's exactly like mine when I think of how fucked up things have become. I should have never had sex with him, yet I'm still craving it. That complete lack of self and the thing I become when I let him push inside of me for the first time. I miss the ceaselessness of thought and the indulgence in every wicked thing my body tells me is true love. Because that isn't love. I don't even like the nihilistic moments when I want to pretend it is.

Is real evil the pursuit of wickedness? Or just the absence of anything good? Is real evil doing bad things, or just refusing to do anything good?

Or, as I saw in the vacancy of goodness that reflected from Kakarot's sexual gaze, was it simply hollowness? The lack of anything at all?

Oh, how I knew now why Kakarot wanted drugs, half the reason Columbia still existed at all. Because I fucking wanted drugs right about now, THAT'S WHY! I craved his sex like he craved heroine. I needed that fascinating euphoria where all my questions maybe weren't answered so much as just didn't mean shit. I was content, in the moments I threw myself within him, hearing his gasps as I tore my way upwards fiercely, breaking tissue and everything else, just to force myself deeper inside of stupidity. Because that's what it is, to want all knowledge gone. It's the desiring of stupidity.

As much as I found the saying "ignorance is bliss" as pathetically overused, I still wanted to use it.

But why? Why would Kakarot have hidden the dragon balls? In all of his self discovery that came from loss, in all of the damage and sacrifice of self, why the hell wouldn't he have reversed it all with a wish, if he knew he could?

Oh yes, Krillin's words came back suddenly. As much as he knew me from his past, I certainly didn't understand him or any of his motives.

I knew he was angry with me. For leaving, for abandoning him to the questions that no doubt wrecked his world. Why wasn't he happy, he must have wondered. I was his messiah, his means for all the answers. The being he had known and waited for his entire life. I was meant to heal it all, to be beside him while all the cruelties were forgotten and his utopia was erected for everyone.

But nothing had really changed for him and I sensed all frustration in this. He was horrified that nothing had been fixed. He looked into my eyes and it was as though his soul spoke to me. And every word, it said, broke something inside of myself when it was voiced.

"You can," It promised. "You can save me if you want to."

I was Fate's Promise to him and yet I failed him in the moments I didn't return. In every second we had spent, having awesome sex and then never being sated, he had begun to wonder. Every moment he pushed a needle deeper inside bruised, tired veins, never contented, he began to wonder. Every moment he spent now, deep inside a stranger, knowing he should be thinking of me, and not? He was beginning to wonder.

And deep down, deep deep down where he pushed all the questions and hid them with drugs, he was beginning to wonder why that sense of missing something, why it wasn't gone.

Oh yes, he was beginning to truly, truly wonder indeed.

I watched a sunrise for the first time in a very long time. And it was somewhat jaded to me. I watched the beautiful oranges and yellows streak across the blues of the sky, the first touches of light moving upwards in the same dance they have been doing since the dawn of time. And I wondered within myself how something so constant, so scheduled, could still be so ultimately beautiful that it'd leave one breathless.

I thought for a moment, in my mind of mind's, how a sunset and a sunrise are only so beautiful because they're constantly changing. Because you can take a hundred pictures of a sunrise and paint a hundred canvases of such, but you'll never really be able to keep one. Not even a memory can sustain a sunrise.

And I can't say it was ruined by the storm, only contrasted dramatically, when dark clouds crept over the darker side of the sky and rain and thunder and all of it cracked down from the heavens. Still, a part of the sky, despite the approaching darkness, was beautiful and untouched, unafraid of what was coming. As promised, it just continued to rise, even when covered with gray.

I smiled faintly, knowing that behind dark clouds, behind the sheets of rain and flashes of lightening, a beautiful, soft sunrise still existed, as though nothing really had changed at all.

I felt for where he would be, knowing he was awake and closing my eyes. I didn't know what I would say, or what I would even do at this point. I knew only that I needed to see him, to end all of this, one way or another.

I followed the dark clouds, sifting through their smokey depths as I searched for him. Over seas he had made beautiful, through air he had cleansed, I reminded myself that I needed to hate him. I needed the age-old fury that sparked my justice, as it had for years.

Yet, as I found him, all my hardening ceased and I just looked on, through the stones that spoke people's names, through old, wilted, tear stained flowers, and I saw him standing. The cemetery seemed suddenly so hideous, as the sky felt like it was falling over us, the rain and wind touching their cold fingertips over the headstones of so many lost souls. I knew quite abruptly where we were and it melted any resolve I had thought I had.

"So... you can cry." I spoke softly, not even looking towards his reaction. We both just stared forwards, our eyes unfocused over the names so familiar on granite headstones. Small tear tracks ran from the dark lids of his eyes, his mouth held tight as he gazed down. The black locks of his hair dangled over his eyebrows, wilting, it seemed, from the heavy rain.

"Can't you?" He asked me, voice low.

"I suppose," I answered softly, shrugging. "From time to time."

"Then why couldn't I?" He paused. "We're not so different you know."

I looked at him halfheartedly.

"Yes we are." I breathed, my voice raspy. "I have to believe we are."

There was silence as I lowered my head, hardening my own resolve and scraping together the pieces of it.

"I have to believe the things you've done are things I'm entirely incapable of doing myself." I told him softly. "I have to think I'm greater than a man that drowns himself in sexual debauchery and the inability to accept life without resorting to death."

He met my gaze, no animosity in his look though I could tell I'd hit a cord somewhere within him.

"You just wish we were different," he finally answered, looking away. "You couldn't handle the part of yourself that reminds you of me. We're the same person, believe that. But we're also only as sane as our options. You hate what I've become because you see that part of yourself and you fear it. I understand this because I am you."

I scoffed at that, unwilling to believe him.

"You fail to see the bigger picture, Goku," He sighed, exasperated with me. "I wouldn't have either if I hadn't seen what I have seen in this world. I could bask in my ignorance forever, like you do. I could drown my fears with promises of heroism. But I don't have that commodity anymore, that privilege of stupidity. I wish you could see things my way."

"I'm glad that I don't." I told him.

"Of course you are," He answered, still gazing softly at his surroundings. "You see cruelty when you look at me. You see a beautiful monster that resembles the man you see in the mirror. But you separate yourself from that. You don't see the gifts I'm giving humanity."

"And what gifts would those be?" I asked accusingly. "Death? Fear? Hatred? Cruelty? Slavery? Not much of a Christmas List if you ask me."

He chuckled with little humor, his shoulders shaking a tad.

"A future," He breathed. "A future where the earth is free of pollution. Where there is no untimely death or mass destruction. A time when values and morals are set in stone and cruelty untolerated as it has been in the human legal system. A future with justice."

"Acquired from the slavery of its inhabitants." I spat.

"The humans now hate it..." He shrugged. "I get that. But I'm promising something they never could have provided for their children, locked away in their four foot cubicles with their petty, mauled ideals of 'freedom for all'. Their children will see a world the earth has not seen for centuries. Animals once thought to be extinct will flourish yet again, eagles souring the skies like common robins. Tigers and lions and elephants uncollected by greed, roaming the world in numbers unseen since the dawn of civilization. Think of it." He looked into my eyes. "A world untouched by overpopulation, the fears of global warming completely forgotten. Natural disaster the only real evil left. I can give that to them. I can promise them that."

"Through fear," I told him. "Through tyranny and fear. No. Peace was never truly accomplished by warfare. I have to believe there is a better way to achieve freedom then through slavery. I have to believe there is a better way than this."

"Well go ahead," He shrugged me off. "you keep to your beliefs and I'll continue with action. Think until you wither off the face of the earth and see how much my fear over the world will have improved it by that time."

I shook my head.

"You can't rule with fear." I said softly.

"Is there any other way?" He asked me, raising an eyebrow. "If there is one thing global religions have taught me it is that fear is the only means to induce action. Fear is the only language understood by all tongues. So you bore them with your petty ideals of 'playing nice' and I'll do what is NECESSARY to make this world a better place."

He breathed a shaky sigh, all the tension and hardness of his body leaving as he suddenly cracked to his knees, falling backwards to the ground and sitting with his legs crossed. I joined him, feeling the grass cold beneath my fingertips as I shifted them through the blades. We sat in our contemplation of each other and ourselves, both probably deciding that at this point, there would be no conclusion to this argument. I guess I realized at that moment that in all my figuring I didn't understand anything at all about him, the more I was realizing, I didn't know much about myself either.

His eyes were glued to the dusty headstones, ChiChi's name and Gohan's left with no last name. It seemed crude to me yet appropriate. Names forgotten yet legendary. No one that worked their 14 hours in the fields would know the impact these two simple names had had on their ultimate fate. No one would stare harshly at dirtied fingernails and understand the passion behind the monster. No one would ever look into the eyes of the slave master and see that two simple names on ugly gray headstones could push him to the very brink of his own sanity.

No one would ever really know.

"I think the only time in my life I ever prayed was when she started to cry tears of blood," He whispered suddenly, surprising me. He seemed completely worn out, face pale and drawn back as he just sat, shoulders slumped as though the whole world rested on them.

"I don't even know who I was praying to." He shook his head. "I've been this side of the world and the other, I've died and risen again; and I still don't know who ultimately holds my soul or where I go after this. Will I see them ever again?"

He swallowed hard, blinking his eyes.

"I think not."

"You don't know that," I told him, shaking my head.

"I think I do," he sighed. "I think they reside now in a place far better than this one. I tell myself that my wife would be proud of me, of the results despite the means. But I don't really know that. I see a world where my son could run free without the fears of pedophiles or kidnappers but then I realize... everything," He looked up. "All this. He'll never really see it. I can change a billion futures by myself, in fact, change an entire world single handedly. But that doesn't give me the power to show him this beautiful world. No force of future can change the past."

I thought of the dragon balls, of their disappearance. I thought of all the mysteries he still held and I just let them die for a moment. I let him sit in his silence, thinking of my own family. In some ways, maybe he was the better man, the man I should have been. I took my family for granted. I did. I saw my wife as an impediment to the life I really wanted to live. I saw my son as boring and someone I could never understand. But I envied Kakarot in some ways. He would forever remember his family in a way I never would and he would appreciate every memory he had left. Me? I looked back even now and saw days with them as wasted.

"I dream of her now," He told me in a raspy whisper. "Even last night. I guess it's wishful thinking that she's proud of me. She looks as she always did, untouched by sickness and death. She says something to me. But I can't..." He swallowed, choking back tears. "I can't make out what she's saying."

I watched his features, as he tried to gulp down the pain, the sadness and loneliness. I could recognize every pained feature because they were my own. I touched my hand to his back, expecting him to shrug it off. He leaned slightly into it, to my surprise.

"I can't hear her," He told me. "I never could understand why. Why? What was she saying? Why couldn't I make it out?"

Tears escaped his eyes and he tilted his head towards the sky as he cried.

"And then I knew," He sobbed, shoulders shaking hard. "It's because...I've forgotten."

I pulled him in a crushing embrace against me, feeling every inch of his body rocked by the sobs.

"I can't remember what she sounds like!" He screamed in agony. "I can't remember her voice."

I held him to me, blinking away my own tears at the thought. He just screamed against me, sobbing until his voice sounded bloody and hoarse; until he hadn't the strength to cry anymore. And still, in his agony and in his defeat, he kept saying it over and over.

"I can't remember," He bawled. "I just can't remember."


	15. Chapter 15

A/N: Hey all! Sorry it's been SOOOOO long but I do have a decent excuse-- You see-- I no longer have a lower case "M" a comma or a period on my keyboard. These all have to be copy pasted in later and it makes for a VERY long, tedious process you can imagine. In fact, my whole computer as I know it is basically going to shit soooooo...

Anyways, this chapter definitely has been a long time coming and I do apologize if there are a lot more errors or what nots. Thanks for your patience.

Rated M for a reason:)

Camaro

He sat there, numb, unfeeling on my bed. Glaze kissed the surface of his eyes, as an emptiness I'd never seen remained behind black pigmentation. It was as though he'd been comatose for an hour, sitting amongst the blues and oranges, in a world I'd never ventured nor wanted to. Secrets ran in streams of subconscious, his lids occasionally blinking when the smoke from his ignored cigarette would drift lazily into his eyes.

He let out a small sigh, finally raising the neglected to his lips and taking in a long, hard drag that made me queasy just watching it. The embers burned and the long ash fell away, landing softly on the fingertips of his left hand. He lifted them tiredly, examining the ash almost curiously through bloodshot eyes before rubbing his fingers together, dissipating gray over the surfaces.

"Will you be alright?" I asked, standing over him with my arms crossed.

"When am I not alright?" He sighed as though it was the stupidest question he'd ever heard. "It's like the world keeps going, even when everyday, you feel like it should have stopped. Like you mourn and die every minute but no one knows it. The earth turns as it has done for millions of years, even when you think it's laying in pieces around your shoulders. But you go on. You die, you wake up and you go on. There is no other way."

I lifted his forearm in my hand, tracing track marks.

"Is this another way?" I raised my eyebrow. "Another way of honoring their memory, of going on?"

He rolled his eyes, yanking the appendage from my grasp.

"You know why you always fucking bring that up Goku?" He snapped. "Because it is the only visible characteristic that differentiates you.. from me."

I swallowed, turning away and knowing that he was right. Yeah, I hadn't stooped to drugs and he had. And maybe I fucking loved that. But in so many ways, I'd gone so much further than he had in the way of "stooping"; only, my arms didn't look like a road map to tell about it.

"Where do we go from here, Kakarot?" I sighed, looking away from him. "I want to be with you. How sick does that make me; craving oneself like a regular addiction?"

"The Gods must laugh at us," He smirked a little, nodding as he rested his elbows on his knees.

"You understand me," I looked up, rubbing the backs of my arms as though I were cold. "in ways no one else could. Yet, we are different enough to still intrigue each other. And," I looked at him seriously. "to still keep secrets from each other."

"I'd say the arrangement would be perfect," He grinned sexually for a moment before letting it fall. "If not for one thing."

"And what's that," I lowered my eyebrows.

"You don't love me." He shrugged. "And I don't love you."

We sat for a moment, in the peace of this admission. It was as though we both smiled at each other, glad to have put to rest what we'd both wanted to say for so long; that this was empty, void of any real point at all. And that though so many people could go through their lives with multiple partners, feeling next to nothing, our lives wouldn't be spent that way. Or, well, so I thought.

"If it is any consolation," He grinned satanically, standing up and walking towards me. The tight leather of his pants brushed between his thighs, muscles rippling unapologetically beneath the clinging raven material of his shirt. He turned his head upwards, letting the light gleam over the top of his lips, the burgundy forming a full smile as he tilted his face back and laughed. "I loved fucking you."

I felt my body churn at that statement, wanting to scold him for voicing the very obvious. I watched in fascination as he slowly approached, unfastening his belt in the process, letting it glide like water around his hips, before holding it in his hand. I gazed at is as it dangled, collecting reflective light on its smooth, polished surface.

He softly pressed his forehead to mine, rubbing his nose across my cheek and making me swoon with the heat of his breath. My fingers trembled with anticipation, as they reached ahead of me, either to push him away or simply to touch him, I wasn't sure. Poison filled my resolve and I let the pads of my fingertips trace the muscles beneath his tight obsidian shirt, feeling as his lungs heaved hot air within his immaculate body.

"I loved it," he whispered, curiously moving his lips close to mine before pulling away teasingly. "I loved sucking your cock," he kissed me lightly, "I loved feeling inside your body," he kissed me again, "I love tasting you in the back of my throat and swallowing you inside me."

I was rock hard as he tilted my head back, sharp teeth grazing over my flesh when I felt his hands massaging me through my pants. I caught my breath, gazing at him through lidded eyes as he yanked me back and forth, watching my face for all the pleasure he knew would be there.

"I loved pushing inside you," He whispered through gritted teeth, removing his hand and instead, wrapping it in the back of my hair painfully, grinding his own erection against mine. "I loved making you bleed all over my shaft."

I was now painfully close to cuming, as he held my hair in an agonizing grip and his other hand wound over my hip, digging me against him.

"And I loooved making you scream," He spat almost hatefully, tearing my head back to lick from my collarbone to my chin. "As I came all over your back."

Before I knew what had happened, I was on the bed, the belt on the back of my neck as he forced his arms over my throat, successfully choking me. His knee rubbed up and over the tight surface of my shaft, the black leather showing every line my appendage pushed against. His knuckles were white as he pressed them down on either side of the bed, the belt slowly choking me, leaving only enough room for occasional gasps of air as he pulled his knee over my crotch.

He knew that I loved this, as surely as I would never say it and as surely as he would have loved it himself. He pulled the belt tighter, until I nearly lost consciousness, both ends in one hand as he let the other smooth down my body as I wriled beneath, sensitive in this state to every single touch. The pressure built beneath my eyes, until my flesh felt swollen around my lids, my lungs burning within my body as I spasmed beneath him.

I felt like I was having a seizure, the world turning impossible colors, solid objects becoming fuzzy, glittering pieces of dice to my bloodshot eyes. Every surface of my flesh was on high, every nerve ending tingling with the anticipation of some sort of release.

He'd torn the shirt from my body, his tongue leaving trails of saliva down my torso. A small blade glimmered suddenly, my eyes begging for focus as soon as I saw the gleam of light in its reflection.

What was he doing with a knife?

My back lifted from the bed, a choked cry coming from a throat that could not scream as he wrenched the sharp surface over my lower belly, blood bursting into his face. He laughed as I heaved beneath the touch of the blade, squirming to free myself from the pain but too weakened with asphyxiation to do anything about it. I shuddered from his cruel laugh, seeing the old detachment in his eyes as he went to the other side, right above my cock, the blade slicing sickly into my sweating, moist flesh. Veins pumped beneath the flesh of my throat, every muscle straining against my skin as I watched him drink my blood, watched him indulge in the most deranged sadism.

I fought at him with my arms, though they were heavy and clumsy from lack of oxygen, being batted away from him.

"Shhhh shhhh shhh," He cooed, petting the wounds as he licked the blood, smearing it over my heaving torso. "you like this, I promise."

I shook my head, throwing it back with a choked scream as I felt the knife again, running over my abdomen, followed quickly by a spray of hot blood that seemed to almost soothe the pain. His hold on the belt tightened even more so, until I could no longer strain upwards to see him cut my body, my neck held down painfully against the bed, allowing only the smallest amounts of air.

I gasped for it, my eyes shut tight as I focused on what he was doing, hating myself for being so rock hard when his tongue would lap between the folds of a wound, sucking at the agony and giving me horror and pleasure all at once. I trembled uncontrollably from it, straining against the heaviness of my arms and the restraint around my throat.

My back arched on its own, leaning into the tip of the blade as it rested over my right pectoral, subconsciously making my body press itself into the pain. Though thoughts were tumbled at best, I knew, horrified by the revelation, that he was absolutely right. I did like this. I did love this.

The feeling of utter abandonment of domination came over me, letting me slightly rejoice in my own defeat, in letting someone entirely control me. As sadistic as we both were, we also craved masochism from time to time, letting the pain become a very sick euphoria for us.

I swallowed as much as I could, straining upwards as he cut two deep lines over both sides of my chest, his tongue covering them only moments later as my eyes rolled back into my head. My lips trembled as he kissed them, leaving trails of blood over my chin.

I was flipped over quickly, my pants torn from my body as I was thrown on all fours, the belt still securely wrapped around my throat as I steadied myself, trying to remain upright as he lubricated himself and pushed inside me. I gasped, glad that he was allowing me a tad more slack to breathe, groaning deep within myself when he wrapped his one free hand around my body, jerking me painfully as he threw himself inside my body.

Blood pooled beneath me, dripping onto the bed, but I didn't care, arching my back so that he could dive deeper into me, the soaking tip of his cock plunging against my prostate. I wrenched my fingers into the bloodsoaked sheets, wanting to turn suddenly and take his entire length into my mouth, to feel it slip down my throat like water and drink his cum before it threatened to pour down my neck. Instead, I let him fuck me, feeling his whole body slap against mine as I never had before until he was choking me, making my thought process stop and forcing every nerve to be more sensitive than ever to what he was doing.

He stroked me long and fierce, the sounds of him making precum leak down his knuckles, my lower body stretched with the huge size of him, of us. I was coming close, so close to exploding, when he let me go, both hands wrapping around the belt and tightening as he literally fucked me harder than I've ever been fucked in my entire life. Just the sounds reverberating from the walls made me shiver, sweat pouring over the bed, diluted with blood as he pounded inside me, harder and harder until I felt my cock literally lift up and blow with cum, soaking my chest and stomach, his own forcing itself out so hard I was nearly lifted off of him, feeling the thick heat drip down from inside me.

Ah, the seldom experienced autoerotic asphyxiation orgasm.

I limped slightly as I walked through the hallways, my body feeling like I put it through a meat grinder. Why? Why did I indulge in this still, giving the finger to any conscience I'd ever had? I shook my head, sick with myself and in desperate need for a shower, for a few minutes where I'd sink to the bottom of the tub and scrub myself raw of guilt.

I felt my fingertips go numb as I suddenly walked passed a doorway, choking on my own saliva when I saw it--- saw her.

Her. It's a her. A human. Not an it.

Her.

Bulma.

I wanted to vomit. I wanted to launch myself to the floor and vomit.

I couldn't even feel my body suddenly, like I'd been pulled from it and remained just a set of eyes, seeing this... this horrific THING. I wanted to consciously call it a thing, an "it" as I couldn't bring myself to recognize it as her; as Bulma. What remained of the beautiful face was in a word... horrific. Monstrous. One side of the once immaculate face was still in tact, the blue, beaming eye blinking as though it didn't see me, didn't recognize this odd, tall man just gawking at her. The other side was awful, twisted by metal cruelly intended to conceal the monstrosity beneath it. Skin was wrinkled, twisted and pulled viscously beneath the cold silvery chrome, red buttons meant for machines blinking over the area another blue eye was meant to be in.

The gurgling of yellowish green fluid was heard as tubes carried the thick liquid into her face, pumping sickly into her skull that was crushed on one side. Patches of black seemed sucked into the wrinkled, rotting flesh of her neck, gangrene festering on part of her mouth.

I didn't even realize I was trembling until my knees had buckled, landing painfully on the concrete as I continued to stare.

"B--...Bulma?" I stammered, wanting the thing to shake its head, to look at me as though I'd gone crazy and tell me that the real Bulma was just down the hall; that what consisted of a disfigured creature standing in front of me was just a crude joke.

No recognition crossed the putrid features, the only sound the nauseating suction and gurgle of the tubes. The thing crouched to the ground as if copying my movements, my own body shuffling away without my consent. I didn't want to be afraid, didn't want to be a coward as I scrambled from the thing; yet I was, without doubt, horrified.

The thing cocked its head to the side, blue hair dry and greasy as it poked in patches through holes in the metal. The old, messy clothes shifted over a body that was still (strangely enough) in tact, though rotting around a form that should (by all natural accounts) be in the ground. A notepad and pen hung around her neck oddly- unused as though just wishful thinking had inspired someone to put it there. How was this even possible? I dared think that this thing could only be a zombie, or an awful, dead puppet suspended by threads I couldn't see.

The meer movements of its body were unnatural: slow yet sporadic, as if the bones cracked with each motion. It slid closer to me and I had to mentally force myself to remain still, body trembling around my bones. We stared at each other for a while, curiosity crossing her features as though the mind behind the mask of horror could barely discern me as even human.

I just gawked, watching this thing, this girl that was once my greatest friend and now... now I don't even know what she was...

Kakarot.

He had done this.

He had made her this way.

"He's..." I managed to barely speak. "He's a monster."

A glint crossed her eye, as though something had struck her. A word.

A word suddenly instilling life back to her face-- knowing back to her eye as though suddenly she were waking from a deep sleep.

The word 'monster' in fact, awakening her for a moment.

Her hand rose to her face and then over her heart.

"Monster?" I said it again, watching as something akin to panic went over her features. It horrified me. She touched her chest again, patting over her heart.

"No," I shook my head, feeling tears go into my eyes. "No baby..."

I felt myself start to cry, my bottom lip trembling.

"You're not a monster ok?" I sobbed it. "God, I..."

I looked up and then back at her.

"God, I promise you. You are not a monster."

Her eye stared into mine and against what I thought I could do, I pulled her body to me, hugging her close as I cried. I just held her there, against the shaking and trembling of my whole body. The beautiful mind lingering only in echoes within her. A crude shelter for the once vivacious woman that had prided herself on wisdom and beauty in her youth; now something that resembled a mangled, man-made corpse.

"I'll make you beautiful again," I whispered. "I promise you. I'll make you so beautiful."

She pulled back, a tear falling from her eye as she stared at me.

She glanced down, grabbing for the small notebook and pen she held around her neck. I watched with fascination as she did the very thing someone had only dreamed she could, writing slowly and almost illegibly over the paper. She held it towards me, her eye pleading with me.

The word she had written said "Free."

I stared in shock of what it meant, what she was trying to tell me. Free her. Set her soul free.

I shook my head, a new batch of tears falling down my cheeks.

"No," I told her. "I can't."

As if the small cloud of understanding had left her, the notebook fell, nodding limply over her chest. The light left her eye, as though her mind had just turned off like that. The single tear that had risen, fell down her cheek in a cold line but she didn't seem to understand or even acknowledge it.

She just stared at me with no recognition of who I was, standing numbly. The clatter of metal striking concrete came and I stared at what appeared to be a tape-recorder.

I lifted it to my ear as she left, shaking as I turned it on.

Hushed sobs were heard and I pulled the audio recorder from my ear, staring at it strangely. What is this? The voice was nearly sexless, so distorted with agony. Was it someone being tortured?

Clacking of heels on tile came in the background and I squinted, lifting the device closer. Someone was running, holding back sobs as they clambered towards an unknown destination. Did they realize the recorder was on?

A crack was heard as a door was slammed, beeping sounding and what might have been an elevator running in the background. The crying now became sobs, still slightly hushed but louder than before. A knock came as the device was apparently clanked against a wall. The breathing came louder now and it sounded as though the tape recorder was being held against someone's lips as they panted and bawled.

"She's dead," the sexless voice whispered in a shaky voice. "She's dead."

A clicking noise then came and the time span was unknowable. The crying had stopped and it seemed as though the owner had turned off the device for some time. Beeping and various mechanical noises were heard in the background, the robotic creaking of something heavy being lifted into the air.

"She's been dead now for 2 hours," Came the voice of none other than Dr. Briefs. I cringed, having a very sick idea of where this was going. "Her bodies basic functions have turned entirely off."

A slight sad sigh came and then he spoke again, voice in a hushed whisper, sounding on the very verge of madness itself.

"But what if I can bring her back?" He hissed. "She wasn't meant to die. No. No she can't be dead. It's not her time. I'll bring her back. I can make her whole again."

I gasped, wrenching the thing from my ear. No. This was no botched wish to the dragon. This was scientific nihilism, a sick experiment torn from the Godless beliefs of a desperate father. He gave life to a soulless thing!

"No." I said aloud. "Don't."

"It can be restored!" he said in a booming voice, as if answering me. "I can make her move again! I can make her see and think and sing and dance. I can give her life from seeming nonexistence. And then he will see. Then he will know that the power of God is not from those that can take life, but to those that can give it back."

I shook my head. Yes, he loved his daughter. Yes, he wanted her back. But at what price? To display a creature that Kakarot had killed? To show that he had power that Kakarot didn't? Was that love? Was that stupidity born from desperation? Or a very egotistical strive to wield the power of life and death?

"I can restore power to her neurons," I heard him lift what sounded like a glass beaker, thick liquid moving inside. "With this, I can carry nerve signals. I can reconnect the central nervous system and give her basic motor functions. I can awaken her mind and give it back the power to move her hands and legs and feet, restore animation to her body. The heart will come later as at this point, it is basically nonfunctional and unnecessary. Blood will be carried along the tubes with my chemical protein liquid. Yes, by God," His voice became hushed as he sat in overwhelmed awe at what he could create. "I can make her better. I can make it so her body never needs replenishment or fuel to drive forward. I can make these chemicals strong enough to give her immortality.

"Vanity and physical appearance can wait until later. The body cannot rot or all will be lost."

I sat in horror as I heard him prattle on with words I'd never known well enough to understand. He spoke of the power of cell bodies and dendrites, how to awaken the axon terminals so as to extend across the synapse. A thousand things I didn't bother to listen to. I understood to some degree; this wasn't about Bulma at all. Truly, she'd merely awakened the monster in him enough to try something his curiosity had been begging for all along. Every moral fiber had been broken and every scientific promise to uphold creation and the basic balance of life and death was forgotten; and he was only too happy to have a justification or excuse to do it.

"She told me not to," He was whispering in a shaky voice, trembling with excitement and insanity, working away like a modern day Frankenstein. "She told me so often it was sickness in a bottle. Playing God with liquid madness. Ahh but she didn't know. She didn't know that it would save her life. She will thank me for hiding it from her. Man's elixir of life held in my hand!"

Sounds of electricity spitting through the air caused me to pull back once more from the recorder, setting it down on a hard surface as it literally vibrated. I thought it was going to break. Metallic clashing sounded through the scratchy sound device, the smack of something limp banging over and over against a solid surface. A suction sound came as though water was being pulled through thin tubes and a sickening gag sound came.

Like... like something was moaning and choking at the same time.

The recorder clicked. End of tape.


	16. Chapter 16

"Interesting change in hair color." Dr. Briefs grinned, oblivious to both my identity and to my newly acquired murderous nature. The other scientists in the room gawked at me, probably feeling the rage just SEEPING from me, however much the doctor seemed to be ignoring it. They all stepped back as I came up to him, eyes burning.

I grabbed the collar of his shirt, hoisting him into the air and slamming his back against metal cupboards. A slight hitch in breath sounded and he stared into my eyes with the same fear every human held when grasping the fact that I was no more human than a great cat pacing behind metal bars. The very real instinctual fear that they were now dealing with the ultimate unpredictable.

"I'm not him," I said simply, not liking the fact that I so often had to go into an ordeal when stating the obvious. "But believe me when I say we're both prone towards random acts of violence. Which body member are you most attached to and how lucky are you feeling at the moment?"

His eyebrows raised and he managed to choke out a very cliche "who are you" before I dropped him into a heap on the ground.

"That doesn't matter," I said point blank. "and let me say only that any deviance on your account will not go unnoticed. You've seen the Kakarot of this world enact the worst of crimes. I may not be him but I'm feeling extremely versatile at the moment. I'll be asking the questions. You'll be answering."

He hesitated for only a second, nodding finally and then ushering me to follow him.

"Please," He reasoned as I walked quickly behind him. "I'll do whatever you ask, threats or no threats. I'd heard rumors of a strange arrival and I'll tell you whatever you need to know. Only, let's not talk here."

I nodded though he couldn't see, following him into an elevator and watching as he inserted a card from his left sleeve, turning a key and winking towards me as we began to fall. The pace with which the elevator descended was alarming and I grabbed the bar next to me, wishing for it to be over. He seemed less than worried, apparently having done this repeatedly throughout time and I could only conclude that we were going to his secret lab, the basis for all of the horrors he had created.

"There's just so much I'm not understanding," I sighed aloud as we finally reached the bottom, watching as he flicked on lights. The room was huge, a mess of broken glass and machines. The floor was littered with a thousand papers, some waded into balls, botched experiments that didn't compute, others held by bent paper clips. Large fluorescent lights illuminated yellow liquid held in enormous containers that resembled rejuvenation tanks, ugly greenish bubbles floating to the top.

"Yes," He said in a numb voice, catching where my eyes connected. "The same liquid that keeps her mobile. A mass of proteins once used to heal the body's outer wounds and now..."

"To heal a walking wound." I finished for him, giving him a cold gaze.

He swallowed hard, turning from me and placing on his glasses. I took in his small frame, hating myself for feeling the need to be so rough with him. He was human. He was a small man in comparison to most. Yet I saw him as something greater, something to be harsh with. He was a father. He was supposed to be above pettiness and selfishness with regards his family. Yet he'd used her. He'd used his only daughter as justification for something that his scientist's heart had wanted all along. He'd played God with his own flesh and blood and that made me hate him.

I tossed the tape recorder on the ground, the clash of plastic breaking over cement making him jump. He looked down at it, recognition slowly dawning.

"Oh." he said simply.

"I want to know why." I demanded. "I know the how. I want to know the why."

"You mean," He walked boldly towards me. "Why? Why would someone do something like that to his only daughter? Create a monster out of her remains?"

"You mean to tell me that you loved her," I crossed my arms, not asking: telling. "You mean to tell me that desperation for her loss pushed you towards insanity that broke only when you saw what you had done. But please believe I'm not so ignorant as to buy that. You loved her. I know that. You hated that she died. I know that. But I also recognize the human obsession with more. I understand the human fascination with being MORE than human. Why humans write books and create movies and dream within themselves of being greater than everyone else. The human inability to accept basic limitations.

"You saw a means to work as a God and you didn't have her beside you to tell you it was wrong. She told you, didn't she? Isn't that why you hid this monstrous concoction from her? She told you time and time again what an abomination you would create if you used that shit. Yet you would use it on HER? The one being that saw it as blasphemous, you would choose to use it on HER?!"

"I wanted her to understand!" He cut me off, turning away in his shame. "She was the only one that could ever grasp the thin line between life and death. That religious acceptance of a soul's basic plot in the scheme of things was ridiculous. We aren't just a soul with a fleshy shield around us. The body is not so simple as to need a God to fuel it. A body is a complexity not you not anyone else could understand. I had to show her that. I had to make her see what we could do, what we could accomplish!"

"By raising up her dead body!?" I nearly screamed. "By making her into a... a fucking THING?!"

"It didn't turn out the way I had planned," He turned towards me, despair in his face. "I've read Frankenstein, I've read the evils of cloning, of creating life from nothingness. But I believed myself to be beyond that. Truly, Victor was not formally in love with his creation. He made a mass of body parts but held no attachment to the being that had once thrived beneath the flesh. I loved my daughter. I thought..." He lowered his gaze. "I thought that would suffice."

"You thought a lot of things," I said in a cool tone. "but you thought nothing through."

"Perhaps," He said simply, nodding his head. "I saw in my mind's eye her getting up from that table, the crushed side of her face healed instantaneously by the miracle that flowed through the tubing in her veins. I saw the improbable beauty that she'd always resonated with, in full bloom. My mind's vision was clouded by guilt of what I was doing and false hope that it would all turn out right. That she would hop from that table, throw her arms around me and tell me that it was a miracle. That she couldn't believe she had stood so long in the way of progress.

"But it wasn't that way. The moment her body had died the healing process was forever gone, her limbs animated by random thoughts that graze from her memory. If she does remember things, they are almost always forgotten and hushed by the constant state of agony she endures."

"Agony?"

"Her body is made up of nerve systems and censors. That's how she registers anything at all. Her body tells her mind when to move only based on how much pain she is enduring. The valves in her heart that cause it to contort and constrict, releasing the blood and fluid throughout her body, must feel like knives twisting constantly about. Every touch, every movement of the air hurts her. She's in a constant state of pain.

"Perhaps Bulma was right all along, and her soul was released long ago and exists now in a plain far away from here. But whether or not that is true, her body suffers here and will for eternity. She cannot die. Her mind cannot stop and she needs no rest. If her memory is intact and her mind able to process real coherent thought, it must be progressed into a state of absolute madness that neither of us could ever really understand. The torture she feels would have blocked any real thought process from ever really forming and if she can think, she thinks only of the pain that exists every second of every single day."

"So why did you create her? Why did you keep her alive?" I insisted.

His eyes became misty and he sat over a counter, hands riling around each other in his lap.

"I was so in love with my creation," He said in a soft voice. "I looked in fascination as her fingers began to move; as she sat up, her mouth opening as though she was trying to speak. I thought again of how clever I had been, how truly weak minded Victor Frankenstein must have been to gaze on and not be obsessed with what his hands had created. I thought again of how truly I had power that Kakarot could never understand. I thought of how many generations had tried to make this very thing and that in all the history of man, I was the first one to make and to witness the power over that which God only can wield.

"And then I realized, she wasn't trying to speak." He looked into my eyes. "She was trying to scream."

I gasped slightly, horrified by what he was telling me.

"I saw her skin," He shook his head, staring off in terror himself as he recalled the memory. "Fake chemicals pumping like yellow acid beneath rotted, bluish flesh. I saw the bloatedness of her cheeks trembling as the awful greenish proteins flushed into them, her one good eye bleeding puke colors like tears. Her vocal cords had been damaged when he crushed her skull, blood trickling from her mouth as she tried to scream. I had thought so stupidly that the proteins and healing enhancers could have fixed every amount of damage his blow had inflicted, sickened when the chemicals merely made the wounds alive. Blood and fluid pumped from the gashes in her skull, draining like mucus down her face.

"Her eye," He gagged. "it became a pale color, like the eyes of someone dead as the pigmentation drained out. Her arms began to flail about in a shockingly unnatural way, as you must have seen yourself."

I nodded numbly, swallowing.

"The bones pushed unnaturally beneath paper thin skin, festering with pussing sores as the chemicals reacted with infection. I just panicked," he said in a crushed voice. "I looked on and I couldn't believe what I'd created. This horror. This monster. This walking nightmare, a zombie from scary movies manifested in the body of my once beautiful daughter.

"I picked up the largest chunk of broken glass I could find, my fingers chipping off pieces as I trembled so violently. I held it to her throat, gazing at the awful liquid that churned beneath plastic and fueled this animated imitation of life. I just kept telling her I was sorry. She was right, all along so right. I shouldn't have played God. I should have let her rest. I should put her back to sleep, my beautiful baby girl. But then she looked into me, with that nightmare that one could only loosely refer to as an eye, and my God," He raised his fingers to his lips, gaze full of terror as he shook. "She recognized me!"

My fingers felt lifeless and a cold chill ran up the hairs on my neck.

"It was in that instant that I hesitated," He told me. "I saw her as my daughter. I saw her as the one I loved rather than a hunk of moving flesh, incapable of knowing life. And in that hesitation, he found us."

-----------

I had flown towards my cave, my one place of solitude in this madness considered a world. I would find Kakarot, I would demand he free Bulma-- to whatever evil fate she would be left with and then... then I just didn't know.

Only, nothing really turned out that way at all.

I walked in, seeing him standing there, his face contorted by emotions I'd so seldom faced that I was unable to recognize them. There was pain, I knew that. The eyebrows turned downwards, the eyes tinted with sadness and his mouth slanted with loss.

He held the papers in his hand, the ones that I had written, a diary to myself, the only person I thought could ever grasp the meaning of them.

Shit.

"How?"... he asked me, holding them within his fingers.

"Why are you reading my things?" I demanding, stepping forwards.

A new stack of papers left his other hand, burned and chipped at the corners. The diariy he had kept as Gohan and ChiChi died.

"Why would all that matter?" He said coldly. "You've already read mine."

I saw the betrayal in his features, his face completely void of the usual stoic nature it held. His pupils flickered and he glanced away, for once, afraid to meet my gaze.

"How could you do this?" he whispered. I strained to hear it. "He... He was meant to be here."

I almost gasped aloud, realizing the apocalypse that was this revelation. He knew what had been missing. The once fictional creation of his own mind was now realized by the being that had wished it away. I'd taken the one person in his life that had made such an impact that the loss of that person had created an entire alternate dimension. And now? He realized it. Every wish, every feeling, every promise within himself was actualized by the truth: that someone HAD, indeed, been missing.

"How could you?" He whispered once more, finally gazing into my eyes. His lips quivered, his eyes brimming with tears I had never believed could form there. "How could you have wished him away.. don't you see?!"

He turned away, voice cracking as his chin wrinkled.

"Don't you see?" he cried out. "He might have saved me!"


	17. Chapter 17

He hadn't even bothered to hide the syringes from me, sprawled out on the end of the table like so much silverwear, his eyes glazed as he gazed over the wooden boards. It struck me as odd that he would surround himself with such simplicities, so obviously obsessed with the best of the best as we were. His fingernails grazed over wood chips, pieces imbedded beneath the skin, blood and bruises appearing beneath sheer, lacquered surfaces.

"You hate me." I said, not so much a question as a revelation in the moment. Every weird idea or contemplation of our future was washed away and in so many ways, I understood that as much as wishing myself away from reality had been a mistake, I'd made every facet of his life nothing more than a figment of fate. Every loss he'd suffered, every death and every moment that he'd spent laying beneath the cover of his dead wife's arms, wishing he could join her, had been all for nothing. I'd created a nightmare by wishing away reality and he had been the one to suffer from it. How would he not hate me? I'd made every struggle in his life seem worthless.

"No," He told me surprisingly, still staring off into the same spot, drifting along the waves of a drug induced stupor. "I don't understand you."

I looked at him, blinking in concentration.

"How are we the same person?" He asked me honestly. "I feel like we constantly have the same reactions to scenarios but the choices we make? It's like 10 years devided us so dramatically that we can't even identify with each other. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

I shook my head honestly, telling him that I didn't.

"Everything in my life is trivial," He looked into my eyes finally. "Every moment I spent mourning people I'd lost, it was more or less bawling over a bad dream. I cried over a fictional world that I'd created through selfishness. I spent so long believing and feeling within myself that something was missing that I lost out on so many years that I HAD with a real family. I look back and realize I spent so long believing that something had been taken from me; and than thinking I was crazy for missing something that hadn't existed at all. And now? I understand that it WAS missing. And so many feelings are suddenly confirmed and then wasted.

"Honestly, I don't hate you. I don't know what to feel. So many conflicting everythings sit over me and I just feel like drowning it out. Tomorrow can wait until realization is willing to kick in. For now, I want to know the mundane. I want to understand the parts that reality will never let me admit that I desire to grasp. So tell me, my beautiful one, my dear, my closest friend; tell me about love. Tell me about it as I haven't the faintest chance to experience it before I pass on. We both know you've stolen that from me."

I looked at him skeptically, searching myself in the process.

"You really want to know?" I asked.

"You might as well ask a dying cancer patient what the sun will look like tomorrow evening as it falls behind the mountains." he said coldly. "Tell me what I won't ever see. Tell me what you've stolen from me and make me not miss it."

I sighed, his tolerance at a very low level as I sat across from him.

"What can I tell you that a trillion poets haven't written to word a trillion times?" I shrugged. "I fell in love with someone incapable of returning it. We fell for a monster and became one in the process."

"No." He told me, his blood shot eyes drifting upwards. "You keep the beauty hidden behind your eyes. You think I'm going to hold it against you once the realization of what I've lost hits me. But nothing could wound me more than the acceptance that I'll never know love and STILL never have it described to me. So open up, you selfish shit. And tell me in words and a voice that mirrors my own, what is love?"

I contemplated the truth of his words, dismissing their rudeness. Of all the horrors bestowed upon him by my own mistake, I owed him honesty if nothing else. Indeed, he deserved the truth.

"It's like flying," I told him, moving closer. "It's like flying for the first time. The first fall and the first time your strength of will catches you mid air. It's like having sex the first time only the excitement never really leaves. It's like you're constantly in a state of precum, waiting for the next second that person will touch you JUST enough to bring you to climax. Like your favorite EVERYTHING personified."

He nodded, glad that I understood the extent to which he needed this.

"I was once told," he breathed thoughtfully. "by the most beautiful woman... that love, true love, was like the first gasp of air when you've been beneath the surface of water for so long. Like you'd been drowning for such a period of time that you'd almost forgotten that you were even beneath in the first place, your lungs expanding with that first gulp of ecstacy."

"Yes," I nodded. "But sometimes, Kakarot, you keep on drowning. Yes, love brings you up. It fills you up in places that were never empty before. But you bob beneath the waves forever. Love can set you free, that's true. My eyes saw colors that never existed until the morning after I awoke beside him. Everything he did was a pallet of paint, dabbing color into a black and white world that I'd never even noticed. But I bobbed beneath the waves of it. I breathed that air yet he stayed beneath the waves, hands on my ankles as he yanked me under over and over. Love sets you in a new world every day that you step within it. But it can tear you to pieces without knowing that you've left them behind. Perhaps that's the cruellest realization of love. It blinds you. I thought my world was perfect, in fact, missed every clue otherwise, until he was laughing so hard the walls caved in around me. I was selfish for what I did. But he killed us both."

I shook my head, losing myself in the emotion of the moment.

"But he was like, my favorite everything," I whispered, staring off. "Like, the taste of my favorite candy bar, the smell of the prettiest flower. Like the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen." I choked up for a second, swallowing it back. "I swore we were meant for each other. Like the whole universe had been created just to watch us find each other. Like we were both born for the single moments in life we spent together. And then to find it was a lie?"

I looked in his eyes.

"Sometimes I think you're lucky you never felt it," I told him. "You see it as a loss but maybe, in that way, you don't understand the loss." I glanced away, holding my head propped on my wrist. "I was... so in love with him."

He remained quiet, just listening to me.

"I was so in love that I lost myself to it," I sighed. "Like I'm not even a person anymore. Just a thing, marching around the world with no real purpose for being there. I once was so stupid to think that I knew the meaning of life; that I could grasp every secret ever told because I had the answers to everything. I lost myself in my love for him and now," I wiped my eye, irritated with the warmth that built behind it. "God, it's like, I'm just an echo. Just the last remnants of a dream, of the person I was when I was with him."

I choked up, looking towards the ceiling.

"God," I gasped, my bottom lip quivering. "I am sad every day."

He stared at me, unfeeling.

"I feel like," I swallowed hard. "like I could cry every minute of every single day. Like the sadness is just a part of me now, as much as happiness ever was. Like when he said all those things,... like this sadness just took his place in my life and I can't will it away. Sometimes, I just want to hate him SO much. I just want to grab him again and tell him just how BAD he has made me feel. How much anger I have now that I didn't before; how much I wish I could take back everything."

I shrugged.

"But I won't." I said in a blank voice. "Because it's a lie. You can't hate so fiercely if there isn't a part of you that hates YOURSELF for still loving that person. I would never wish away what we had because it would be regretting it. And I can't really regret that. I can't want to forget the best times of my life. When we would laugh at each other for no reason, spending nights beneath the stars and trying to count each one just so we would remember it. You can't hate the best days of your life even if you find out later how fictional they were."

"He must have loved you," He whispered. My eyes widened. "Yes, I believe he did. You were too rash in your descision, weren't you? You believed the words he spoke and that was your undoing, OUR undoing. But I believe within myself, if I truly believe in nothing else now, that he loved you most capably. It's nearly impossible not to. You make me see the beauty within myself as no painter ever could. I go so far as to truly believe that there are few people in the world that exist that could deny a love for you, when faced with the truth of who you are.

"No. He stood before you and lost himself in the light that you illuminate. I firmly believe that. But I also believe, that despite the encompasing obsession he must have met with, his hate was stonger. His hate was long lasting, more granite than the ideas of a fickle love affair with a married hero. So he stuck by the unperishable hatred that had spurned a lifetime of survival. His hatred was his constant. It was his life's blood and the last standing statue of his goal: to be the strongest, to be unbreakable. And he couldn't get where he wanted with love. He couldn't stand as second to you.

"I can only imagine the struggle he must have faced; to recall a lifetime spent with one goal that a love for you would rot. To stare into your eyes and tell himself over and over that he had to keep on hating you. Imagine that. Your body and heart conflicting on a constant basis with what your mind had told itself every day of your life. Had you stayed? I don't know what would have been then. Maybe he would have triumphed in his victory for a while. Maybe your family would have hated you for a long time. But he would eventually see the truth: that every goal reached means another to create.

"He would have seen how pale getting what he wanted could be. And he would have returned to you. Of that I am certain."

"He lost himself within you. He lost that hate, that driving force of life that was the one thing that had never changed. He saw a man in the mirror that only resembled the lost soul he'd always been and it scared him."

I contemplated what he said, sitting in silence, in regret and guilt of what I'd done. I missed Vegeta so completely it scared me yet here he sat, devoid of everyone he'd ever loved because I'd made it so. I hated myself.

"So everything I know, everything I've seen," He sighed. "Is a lie."

"That's not true," I countered. "It's just..."

I trailed off, my eyes on the ground in shame. I couldn't even look at him.

"It's just a figment of a world that your desperation created," He spoke in a solemn voice, leaving no room for debate. "My wishes, my world, my..." He choked a little. "My family."

"It's a real world Kakarot," I shook my head. "It's the same as mine. Only we were set on two different paths at one point."

"And those two paths are seperated by reality and fiction," He told me. "Everything I've gone through was for nothing. Every moment I watched them die might as well have been a video tape I could have turned off and forgotten about. Every second I heard her screaming, every second I watched his body convulse until he went into that comma, I might as well have been out fishing. Because it was for absolutely nothing.

"I always thought that in every facet that I'd lost faith, fate was one thing that I would always keep. But there is no fate here," He shook his head. "There is no point to any of the things I have seen and suffered."

We stayed in silence for the time being, my mind flushed with one thing: guilt.

"Yet I still mourn them," He said in a curious voice, touching his fingers over his chest. "Figments of a fictional world and my pain stays true to their memory. I'm still hurting. The pain tells me it was real enough.

"You say that you don't want to be like me?" He looked suddenly furious. "But I dont' want to be like YOU! Listen to me you piece of shit and listen well. You sit in judgement of everything I do but you abandoned your family. You just left them like a fucking coward because you were too ashamed to look like a failure in their eyes and in front all your stupid little friends. You left them in an unguarded world for whichever one of your enemies decides to take the opportunity for revenge in your abscense."

"But Vegeta-.."

"Vegeta, from what I've seen so far, didn't exactly seem to be much of a human fan himself. For all you know, he's completely demolished that world. Or am I wrong since you seem to have grasped him oh so well. You act like I'm possibly the most awful rendition of yourself but you? You are the most selfish person I've ever met! You lost everything because you wished it away rather than being a man and taking the consequences of stupidity. You aren't sorry that you did it. You're just sorry that it wasn't specific enough for you to get away with it.

"I'll bet you haven't even looked back at them, have you? No. You've been too busy, too drowning in your thoughts of him to even look back. They're just boring memories to you, shadows of wasted times you could have been with him! But to me? I think of them EVERY SINGLE DAY of my life. And I don't even see that sadness and mourning as wasted, it's a part of me. THEY are a part of me. Yet you still forsake them with your thoughts, you still betray them every time you think of him. You can't even help yourself. And entire world spawned from selfishness. You should be so proud."


	18. Chapter 18

"So now you'll see," He smiled, his face pulled so wickedly by malice and shadows I figured immediately he'd somehow replaced our identical faces with someone else's. No, there was no possible way I could physically will mine to look so satanic. "now you'll know yourself better than ever. You truly believed, in your everlasting naivety, that I was the embodiment of the worse thing you could ever become. But you haven't even SEEN evil. You thought me decapitating that old bastard in the forest was the extent of my horrors? You're fucking crazy."

He stood, staring down from eyes that COULDN'T have been mine, making the table shake. But it wasn't HIM that made the surface quiver and I glanced in shock that my own fingertips on the table quaked so rapidly that even the ground beneath me was trembling with the force. Was I so afraid of what he would do or the fact that I'd have to realize, circumstantially, what b I /b could do?"

"You're going to feel exactly what I have felt for years," He seethed, voice raspy as he shot the words out of tight vocal cords. "You want to understand me? Isn't that what you've been meaning to do from all this? To see," He cocked his head to the side, mock innocence and sweetness lacing his features. "to know the man you might become in a 'worse case scenario'?"

He threw a chair into the wall, both nearly shattering with the force.

"Well now you're going to get your chance. You're going to feel everything I have felt since I watched them die. You're going to know my wrath at what you've stolen from me. And the worst thing I can give you, you'll beg for more of."

I fell backwards into my chair, quivering like a fucking dog as he moved uncomfortably close into my face.

"You're going to fucking love me," He promised. "You're going to fucking love me as much as you ever loved him."

With that, he reached into his pocket, pulling out a strange device. No sooner had my eyebrows clenched in confusion than pain, so great it knocked me unconscious, pulverized my whole system.

I awoke, writhing in agony, every nerve ending screaming with torture, needing no conscious consent from me. I screamed. God, I screamed. I felt my windpipe gradually being damaged with the force, my cries going silent eventually as my body could will me no more air. The worst scream, I figured at that moment, was the silent scream from pain that cannot even be voiced.

I stared in terror at my kneecaps, blown into gory, pulpy matter, bone chunks and blood smeared from my pant-legs to my face. My body flailed up and down from the torment, my mouth contorted into a cry that wouldn't come out.

I just wanted to die. Just die. Just fucking go SOMEWHERE this pain didn't exist. Uhhh dragon...? Is it too late to resend that wish? Maybe wording it "just anywhere, NOW" would have been a better idea in the first place.

Somewhere in the torture, I felt his presence over mine, his smiling face a foggy blur.

"I knew you were stronger," He was laughing. God damn skid-mark sociopath. "I knew if it eventually came down to raw, brutal power, I'd stand a kickboxing kangaroo's chance at beating you. But I'm smarter, don't you get that by now?"

He hoisted me up by the front of my shirt, glaring into my pain-constricted face.

"I blew out your kneecaps the first time, installing a pair of control-activated bombs (generously constructed by Dr. Briefs himself) into your legs. Or did you think he was there for no reason?" He cocked his head to the side. "I knew one day you'd need to be humbled, brought to your 'knees' ironically enough. I just didn't realize how ingenious that little quirk would prove to be."

He slapped my face, that small pain never even registering on my sky-high scale.

"Or do you really think I just go around blowing out people's kneecaps for a hobby?"

I threw my head back, my skull on the verge of cracking as I pounded it against the concrete, begging it to render me unconscious.

"Y---YES!" I ground out through gritted teeth.

His face went serious, a cool, cruel mask of indifference.

"You're God damn fucking right I do."

He landed a kick to my chin, kneeling down suddenly and grabbing my bloodied face.

"I'm gonna give you a wonderful gift Goku," He said sweetly, batting his eyelashes. "You want SOOO much to 'embrace' your 'enslaved' people; to 'grasp' their tormented existence. Well trust me, when I'm finished, you'll understand to a very real extent JUST how limited my mercy can be. I'm going to show you true evil and you're going to love me for it."

The rest of this ordeal cannot be truly rewritten to form. It's hard to describe so I'm going to throw to the winds "extensive vocabulary" and just use simple words. I can't really tell you what happened from then on. Or at least for that period of time. I was drugged and I was beaten. I know that. That's pretty fucking simple to decipher. But to what extent, I can't really recall. I think, in the ways of our grand creator, shock is an awesome gift. My mind won't will me to remember what he did to me, and for the life of the rest of me, I don't dare ask it to.

I'm glad to forget and I thank whatever God chooses not to take a ripe one on me each day, that I continue to forget.

So instead of trying to get out my "well gee, I THINK this is what happened..." theory, I'll simply rewrite what I had originally, in those awful moments, written on the ground beneath me and the walls of my cell. A lot of it I'll have to roughly interpret, as real sentences and logical thought were a damn near impossibility in my drug induced madness. And a lot of it, I'm going to honestly tell you, I have no idea if it's true or not. I guess maybe I don't want to think it is, as sick and grisly the mental images come. And yeah, I'm gonna warn you right now, if you're weak of stomach or just don't "dig" the gory stuff, you're going to want to skip this part of my story.

But enough fucking suspense. This is what I wrote:

i _You put the poison in my veins again and I'm prone to thank you for it. You've given me this world, this euphoria of make-believe that sets us, again, apart from everything in the past. You smile with your immaculate face, promising you love me when you cut me. Blood trickles like tear drops and hot kisses, fucking me from behind while you dig the blade deeper._

_You love me. _

_You love me._

_And I think I love you._

_One more jab with the needle, ah yes, there it is. I love you so much, my Vegeta, my God, my Kakarot. You hurt me because you feel the intensity don't you? You burn me with coals because they can tell me so much more than you can. Human words mock the existence of the fire between us._

_You always hurt the ones you love. They just never understood it before me._

_Your laughter makes me smile as you tell me what scientific machination is coursing through my blood stream, telling me that I just love you because you're making me do so. If only you knew, I scream until my throat bleeds because I want you so much. _

_I thought I'd loved before. I was so wrong. _

_You raped me with a knife today, making me suck on the barrel of a gun while you did it, driving the stiff, hard blade deep inside me as I coughed and choked in my agony. Then you released two bullets into my body, right down my throat. The metal still lingers, sweet reminders that you'll be back to dig them out later. _

_You promise me. _

_You promise me a thousand things._

_I was buried alive, a pipe down in the hole with me, the only thing that kept me alive, long enough to breathe, long enough for you to listen to my maddened screams in the darkness. I could hear your laughing for three days while I begged to be let out, begged for food. On the fifth day, you tore me free, my mother, birthing me once more into the world as I was met with Roman's screaming form. _

_"The Princess sang and her voice was so beautiful that the dragon's evil powers were cut off and he fell to the ground dead. For nothing so evil could withstand the goodness of her voice."_

_  
I ate him alive and you watched me._

_You kept laughing when you cut pieces of my skin off, dangling before my face as you told me that we were so alike; that you liked to see me on the inside as well as out. I think I smiled before I passed out, feeling you rub the maggots and worms into my wounds._

_I awoke to my freshly healed flesh boiling with insects eating their way out. _

_The servants are complaining that I scream too much, calling me an abomination of life when you hung me by the skin of my neck and back on jagged pieces of metal for all the kingdom to see. They say you're a mad man but I think you're a genius. _

_Even when you call me horrible names, lighting me on fire and pissing on me to put out the flames._

_The regen tank hates me. Or maybe I hate the regen tank. It takes me away from you yet you put me there so often. That's the worst kind of torture you know? I begin to heal and I begin to forget why I'm here in the first place. You think you're punishing me but you're just reminding me. Why I deserve this. Why I need this redemption, your means of absolving me before a world that hates me._

_You make me see my family again. You make me see all the flaws that got me here._

_  
That's why I hate the regen tanks so much. They remind me. _

_Vegeta once told me that a man is only so pure as his circumstances. _

_I don't know why I thought of that now. I think someday, I'll understand what he meant._

--

--

_I'm a little clearer today I think. I don't know. Maybe I'm crazier to be thinking I'm close to sanity. Who knows. Who cares. _

_Whatever he has me on today feels like crickets. Or no. No. More like ants or beetles, crawling through the tunnels of my veins, stretching the skin along my forearms. I think they might lay eggs eventually._

_Oh. Ok, so I am still fucking crazy. That's a relief._

_Dr. Briefs is here. I think he's talking. I don't know for sure. I think sometimes he is but mostly, I think he's just begging. Begging me to stop writing on these walls, begging me to listen to him. Here's a random thought; how the hell did I get these crayons? Oh yeah, Roman. Did you know, humans taste nothing like chicken? They say everything tastes a little bit like chicken. Nah. Humans... humans taste more like pork._

_Blah blah blah... talking talking Dr. Briefs. Paging Dr. Briefs, Paging Dr. Briefs. Enter the terminal of 'Don't Give a Fuck'. _

_He's talking about perfection. God how weird. No wonder he's in here with me. We're both a couple of God damn lunatics._

_"You've got to come to Goku!" He's saying. Paging cartoon hero Goku, paging cartoon hero Goku. Let me get my cape and red underwear. Say, I wonder if I'll get some sort of Captain Planet code ring in this universe?_

_"We need you to save us," He's saying. "You've gotta stop him!"_

_Sure. Uh huh. Just as soon as I manage to throw these underpants over my spandex. _

_"Stop writing what I say you lunatic." _

_Ha! _

_"Look Goku, there's something you need to understand," Ok. "Perfection isn't just an ideal... "_

_Hm._

_"It's a disease."_

_You have my attention Dr. Briefs._

_"Umm,...good I guess," Yep. "Perfection isn't just some idea he's trying to acquire. It's a virus, or in his mind, a cure. A cure for freedom of speech, freedom of opinion. A cure mostly, for free will. Killing their history isn't sufficient enough. History, known or unknown, repeats itself. He believes freewill was God's greatest mistake in creating humanity. Perfection takes it all away. It numbs the part of the brain that contains ambition, drive, anger." Good to know he's downplaying the big boy words. "An infected person cannot even feel irritation! Annoyance!" Awesome, guess I'm not infected huh? "They're fucking lifeless!"_

_He touched my shoulder._

_"He doesn't understand Goku. Human life has no basis to withstand if it feels nothing. Happiness, sadness, anger, pain... people MUST have these in order to live. It's what sustains REAL life." I'm going to be 8,000 fucking years old. "Eventually, when the drug has truly taken effect, there will be no reason for people to even get up in the morning, no reason to even fear death as a consequence."_

_Death hardly seems like any sort of consequence. Consolation prize maybe?_

_  
"Goku, not everyone goes to the rest homes," He whispers. "some, he puts in these cells. I know you hear them. I know you feel the wind change when they scream. They're guinea pigs, just like you." Guinea pigs at least get a water bottle and a wheel. "He's testing the drug in huge doses, testing its different effects at dangerous levels. Some of your days pass and you stare at the ceiling. You don't even want to move, your mind refuses to even process thought as you feel no reason to. It's a miracle your heart even decides to pump at the doses you've been given. _

_"You must stop him. He plans to unleash it upon the children of the world, waiting a few years until they grow, until they begin to calm, until there is no hint of aggravation or feeling. Then the uninfected will go to the rest homes and the world as he sees it will be exactly as he planned; Perfect."_

_Doesn't sound so bad._

_"You'd think so. True, no one will have the desire to over-eat, to use drugs, to have sex without the purpose of procreation. Starvation will never be known, aids and other STDs will be a fairytale. Death will come only with age or whenever he chooses to set the work hour limits. But he doesn't get that there WON'T BE work. There won't BE fairytales. The world will be filled with zombies. Only these zombies don't thirst for brains or the living or whatever. They'd don't have any desire to leave the grave at all. He saw the drive for perfection in humans, the way that the fashion industry ruled the hearts of people, made them strive endlessly and ruthlessly for the perfect body, for the perfect faces, the perfect everythings. He saw the world fall to its knees to achieve the status of blonde, blue eyed, 5'5, C cup, size 1 pants. He saw people starve themselves and throw up in toilets and mutilate their bodies beneath scalpels to become the IMAGE of what they were TOLD was perfect. Why wouldn't he think that would enslave them? They willingly let it! But what HE fails to realize and what THEY failed to realize is that despite human stupidity and prejudice, the world THRIVES on diversity and variance!"_

_-_

_-_

_Where'd he go? I'm on the floor now. Cold cold floor, rough stone surface hurts my crayons. _

_Was he even here? I'm so crazy. I'm going to read this some day and I'm not even going to believe it. Crack-dreams. _

_Oh there she is. Angel. My angel. My pretty blue eyed angel. One side of her face like the ethereal painting someone died before finishing, the other side a Halloween mask. She's just sitting in front of me, watching my crayons wrasp across the ground. I don't even know if wrasp is a word. Such a dark cell, only the light beneath the door letting me see her. _

_I guess you understand me don't you? You're really the only one that does, my once-was-Bulma. In our agony, he sets us free. In our times of real competence, he makes us mad. We love him because he tortures us, because he makes us see that we deserve it. I think that's the worst feeling, don't you? Wanting to hate the person that lifted the bars? Wanting to kill the person that untied the clasp?_

_Your tiny fingertips, yellowed and rotted underneath, touch the wax from my old writing. Your clothes are stained with the seeping fluid that sometimes drips clumsily from that ugly tubing. We would have stopped a long long time ago huh? But he wills us to keep living, to keep remembering. He is God, you know. _

_For now though, it's just me and you. You once asked me to set you free. I say he frees us, but not from these bodies. I can't let you go. I know you beg it of me, everytime I see your eye, every time that small trace of you, Bulma, comes back. In those two seconds where I imagine real thought catches your mind and you're in so much horror at the world around you, you let yourself recede back into cozy madness. _

_You cried once. I know I heard you. Yeah, nod, you know you want to. You cried when you came into this cell the first time. I heard that weird, sucking, gurgling sound that was your intake of breath. _

_But for now, no tears, no gurgling. Just trace the floor with me. Just let me love you, this new you, just like I loved the old you. You're still beautiful to me. Man-made beautiful. Unconventional beautiful. _

_Just like he said, my world thrives on diversity. _

_I told you once, a long time ago, when we were just kids, that when I grew up, I was going to marry you. You seemed so much older than, so much larger than life than I was. But I think you said yes. I think you said it somewhere under your breath, before the wind took it away. And even when you'd gone, I'd watched the yellows and oranges and reds of the sky, and I'd promised myself, someday, I'd be all you ever needed, I'd give you everything you ever wanted._

_But I can't let you go, can I? I can't set you free. Maybe you cried that day, when you first saw me here, because you realized, that as much as you're a caged, man-made thing, I'm married to you now, in all our everlasting agony._

_Locked together in misery, my bride. _

_I'll love you till' death do us part._


	19. Chapter 19

How long had I been there? Days? Weeks? Months?... Maybe years? I'd lost all concept of time, each day swimming into the next, night and day forgotten in perpetually dark cells. I knew night and day only by the wretched fluorescent lights that would come on whenever he'd found a new device for torment and in those days, it was an oddly welcome bout of attention.

I longed for humanity. I longed for a touch, for a scent of another being. I longed for days of being hugged, of feeling the warm brush of skin or hair against my cheek. Those days were long ago and I smelled only the dank musk of Roman's dead body rotting on the far side of my cell. That and concrete; hard, rough, wet, unforgiving concrete beneath my bloody fingertips.

My power was just a memory, just a fantasy that some days I was convinced had never really been there at all. The memory of myself was now just a cartoon hero, a poorly dressed Saturday morning Superman that always saved the day, was frightfully dumb yet expressly loved by everyone.

I'd scratched my fingertips along the concrete until I had no fingerprints, bloody, soft stubs with no nails. Pain became my only companion, the only thing a constant in my life besides the promise that whatever Kakarot came up with next he'd be more than willing to share with me.

"Perfection," He'd sigh orgasmically. "We're so close now. So close now."

His perfect little nail would run sweetly over my bruised flesh, his powerful body straddling me. I could feel his eyes trickling over my exposed skin, hot and beaded with sweat, his tongue gliding over my heaving chest.

"You've been a God send Goku," He'd laughed mockingly, staring up at me. "I couldn't have done it without your willingness to contribute to this little idea of ours."

I could feel his eyes darting over whatever was left of my face, the idea so superficial yet wounding. What was I now? My own face appeared as deranged as Bulma's within my head, stretched skin collapsed upon itself in a grisly mesh of gore.

Wasn't I once beautiful? Wasn't I once more beautiful because he said it was so? Didn't someone once make me believe was the most perfect creature on the face of the galaxy?

Stupid. Stupid really.

"Why?" I'd asked him once. "Why?"

"Perfection is something the human race has sought for since the beginning of their time," He'd told me as though it was the stupidest question he'd ever heard. "They mutilate their bodies, they bleach their flesh, they scald their hair. They plaster their faces with makeup and paste, shape their bones to achieve the one idea that is perfection in their minds.

"And tell me one religion, one religion in the history of time that hasn't based every faith off of one goal: to aspire to perfection."

I'd shaken my head, feeling the soreness of my flesh as I moved it.

"Perfection is so flawed," I'd spat it. "Such a flawed, stupid idea. What is it but the complete absence of personality? The absence of what molds and creates us: mistakes? You fall to figure out how to pick yourself up again. You land ass end in the dirt to remember what tripped you up in the first place. You're essentially trying to permit people from falling altogether and that's ludicrous."

He'd narrowed his eyes.

"Humans can't see it but I must say Kakarot," I'd breathed, trying to sort words in my scrambled brain. "I'm surprised such a simple concept would have escaped you so. Perfection is just an idea created by people who intend to force that idea into the brains of simpletons that might just buy it. But there IS no real definition for perfection and yours? Yours is nothing more than a flawed attempt."

I'd awoken days later, my head coated in sticky, old blood, my hair a mass of crackling, dried fluid. I'd struggled to lift my head off my shoulder, yanking at my arms to help me. A strange realization hit in the form of new surroundings and my arms and legs cuffed. Cold steel, unbreakable even by my standards, gripped my wrists, holding them down to my sides. My legs held the same fate, unable to move even a fraction of an inch.

I struggled, obviously, to no avail, cutting myself stupidly in the process. The warm blood was, strangely enough, comforting as it trickled down my fingers, pooling in my palms as I tried to understand where I was.

I was right-side up, staring through a lacy, sheer sheet. A window lay on the other side of the sheet and beyond that, a beautiful room. An unfamiliar room.

I grit my teeth in frustration, the blood in my hands sinking out through the spaces in my fingers as I made a white-knuckled fist. My head pounded yet in that, I sought an amount of solace, understanding that any pain I was enduring meant that my mind was becoming clear; namely, that Kakarot hadn't drugged me in quite some time.

I pleaded with myself to remain calm, the new soberness more of a curse than a blessing. I was entirely aware of my situation, entirely aware of how fucked up things had been and especially, entirely aware of how fucked up I was. Every ache, every scratch, every bruise throbbed. I could feel the track marks, the oozing needle holes stretching as I flexed my forearm.

Oh God.

My head had finally lain back, the only sound in this infuriating blackness that of myself. My breathing was hoarse, sweat dripping down my throat and exposed chest. Coldness came over my feverish body and I thanked whatever God just might be out there that I still had part of my wife-beater and black pants on.

I began to panic, writhing against my restraints chaotically. I panted and pleaded, staring upwards into blackness, lips quivering as I tried not to lose my mind.

Why was I here?

A small figure came into view, a tiny, petite nurse scurrying through the bedroom before me. Her hands trembled as she straightened everything in view, her head covered modestly by a pink towel. She might have been rather pretty at some point in her life, though anxiety had taken its toll in the form of wrinkles that stretched across her forehead.

Still, she was my savior and I threw my back against the metal frame that held me, shouting at her.

"Help!" I'd screamed, the voice unfamiliar and strained. "Help me please!"

I couldn't even recognize my own voice, the harsh, raspy sound accompanied with things I'd never known: anguish, despair, madness.

"Please God!" I'd finally cried, yanking and writhing and kicking and screaming against my confines. Blood squirted into my eyes from my own wrist, yet I kept on, even as I knew she couldn't hear me, even as I knew she couldn't see me.

I was on the other side of a double-sided mirror in a dark, dark room where no one could ever see me.

I felt my mind nearly collapse into my despair, sweat and blood dripping down my face as I nearly sobbed out my agony and helplessness.

"Help me," I'd whispered to nothingness. "Help me."

In my fall from grace I did discover one thing: the room I was staring into was not an unfamiliar room at all. In fact, as I stared at the sheets laid before me, my positioning apparently right at the headboard, I recognized the room very well.

It was Kakarot's room.

A coldness suddenly came upon me. It started in my fingertips and toes and moved upwards. Every piece of flesh it came over became littered with goose bumps, the chill rising the tiny hair on the back of my neck.

I breathed it in, felt the coldness reach my eyes. I felt it pool on the lower lips of my eyeballs, felt it in the smallest lashes. I even felt it touch the hair of my brow line, sinking deep, deep into my lungs as I tried to breathe.

Tried, tried, tried so hard to form the word before my thrashing and horror returned.

It was then that I understood what I was feeling. That familiar feeling, that familiar sensation that I never knew I'd feel again. A familiar energy that sent dread through every layer of my flesh.

I didn't even want to voice it, the terror pumping so deep and thick through my veins. I was afraid to even say his name aloud, like voicing it would concrete what every fiber of my being was suddenly realizing.

He was there. He was here. And he was close.

"Oh God," I sighed through trembling lips. "Oh God……. Vegeta."

**A/N: Uhh…. Yeah, judging from some of the comments I've gotten on this chapter, I rewrote it so it was a little less vague. So everyone is clear, Vegeta is back.**


	20. Chapter 20

I saw it all in my mind. I'd been confused, I'd been sad, I'd been on the verge of desperation so deep I could have cried and sweated blood; but I had never felt like this. I wanted to wrench my own skin from my body. I wanted to spit acid.

I was enraged to a point where sanity had no usefulness to me.

And I could just see that sick fucking bastard. Oh, but I could just see him, see him so clearly in my own mind that it might have been his.

There he stood, standing on a cliff, the wind wrapping around his long pant legs, the laces dancing to a violent breeze that was as chaotic as the moment itself. He waited, more patiently than one might have ever thought he could, staring hard into the distance. It was like Kakarot himself could feel the magnitude of what was about to happen, like a child awakening from dreams of fairytales only to meet their own fantastic character sitting on the edge of the bed.

This was a creature of fantasy, of fantasies never afforded, the God someone worshipped without ever truly believing they existed at all.

I could feel the trembling in his body, right down to his bones, as feelings of revolution came over every part. His fingers grasped at the tight sleeves of his fitted gray shirt, tucked so quaintly to hide the track-marks that separated us. Or used to at least.

What would he look like? What would he be like? What will this meeting mean? Why was he here?

Every question that penetrated his mind came into my own, despite the distance that separated us. Even as I was chained and caged and drugged like an animal, I saw clouds in my mind, saw that we both waited expectantly for him to magically appear in the midst of them like some super hero come to save the day.

And just like that he did, a tiny speck in the distance that slowly got bigger. Kakarot's heart was beating so furiously that his mind began to fog, his breaths so sporadic that he was close to passing out.

Every part of his body was shaking, his bottom lip clenched between his teeth to avoid the trembling he knew was there. He'd read enough about our past excursions to know that this meeting was always going to be black and white; could go one way, could go another entirely.

Yet it wasn't until Vegeta landed that the emotional impact hit me, my hands coated in fresh blood when I squirmed against my shackles.

His face was perfect once again, Bulma truly having concocted wonders on her darling piece of work. Fresh pale skin was smoothed over those gorgeously high cheekbones, dark flesh around his eyes only causing them to peer all the more deeply outwards. Long black lashes circled eyes the shape of cat's, the pupil syrupy and endless.

I couldn't read his facial expression as I normally never really could (and even when I thought I could, had, in fact, been terribly wrong about it anyways). His lips were held tightly together, the inevitably pissed-off-at-the-whole-world trademark look plastered over his eyebrows.

God he was beautiful. I even felt the word vibrating through Kakarot's mind: beautiful, so beautiful.

The two were truly a dynamic pair of evil, one dressed with black pants and a gray shirt, the other wearing all black that complimented every amazingly chiseled feature on his being.

Yet what struck me as odd was that Kakarot's mind was reeling, not on these things, but on ideas totally to the contrary. He wasn't struck dumb by Vegeta's outwards appearance as everyone else had always been, but by the potential the other man had.

'He could teach me everything.'

The thought permeated his mind, sinking into my own and making my stomach twist in on itself.

"What is wrong with this place?" Vegeta's hateful voice came, arms crossing expectantly over his chest. "This world is weird and your people are even more irritating than the blasted humans in mine."

Kakarot's stature wavered slightly, an almost hurt expression appearing and then disappearing as he tried to conceal it. It was in that instant that an undoubtedly wicked grin came over MY expressions, realizing something that I hadn't originally mulled over; we may have looked identical but I had one thing over Kakarot that he hadn't planned on: Vegeta.

I knew damn near everything there was to know about the bastard, from his moodiness to his complete inability to socialize civilly with anyone. Kakarot had never interacted with the maniacal whirlwind that was Vegeta and it made me laugh like a complete psychopath. Oh, but wasn't that sick pile in for a treat.

"Come with me," Kakarot spoke, trying to match his hoarse, cigarette-damaged voice with mine. "let me show you this world."

Vegeta, as expected, said nothing, gazing intimidatingly in the way that only he could. He was sizing Kakarot up, looking for anything and everything that might account for this odd turn of events they'd wound up in. 

Yet another adoring fact came to my smile and that was another dearest Kakarot hadn't planned for; as observant as I was of my own features and actions, Vegeta could read me even better than I could read myself.

He watched every movement with terrific interest, tongue in his cheek when even the simplest gesture struck him as slightly off. Even the trivial means of talking was catching him off guard, the way that Kakarot spoke so gently and so carefully.

For all his irrational and crude behavior, Vegeta no doubt had expected violence from this meeting, expected a heart-broken Goku with an everlasting grudge to greet him. Instead, this strange, unreadable character had met him, the face and eyes that of Goku but the rest an indecipherable mystery.

Slowly but surely, Kakarot rose to the sky, mind going a thousand miles a minute. Here was his hero, his living, breathing legend; a beautiful, deranged monster. What had he expected? A hug? A kiss? A meeting of two dynamic evils that came together and reigned tyrannically over this ruined world?

Yet even in my absolute hatred of him, I saw a strange light beaming in his eyes that had never been there since I'd met Kakarot; I saw hope. Like a person who had never believed in love, never believed in the meeting and conjoining of two souls, he'd roamed his wasted world like a creature that should have been in the grave years ago. Even now though, a smile that could not be shaken came to his mouth, a slant in the bottom of his eyelid.

He was overwhelmed. The embodiment that completed everything that was never whole, was behind him, flying at just the slightest distance. The man from dreams, he thought were simply that, was within his reach and he was awestruck by it.

I almost felt sorry for him, at his delusional reality. He was just as fucking stupid as I had been, seeing beauty in a soulless beast.

It didn't surprise me when I felt them come closer, didn't even catch me off guard when Kakarot lead Vegeta to precisely where he'd intended to begin with; in this room, right in front of me. Fucker.

Seeing Vegeta with my own eyes was, as you might have guessed, gut-wrenching. Like someone had dug my heart out with a bent spoon and pissed on it, I tore stupidly against my chains. I knew it would never work. I knew I wouldn't get free. It was desperation alone that couldn't let me stay still, couldn't let me watch this fucking traveling circus show.

I felt like a silly puppet, a puppet with a soul, held up by strings that he could never move; wishing and hoping the master would return someday to give him some semblance of life once more.

I wanted to fucking die.

Instead I just screamed like a lunatic, thrashing and throwing myself this way and that, until the blood loss alone stole my power to continue. I prayed maybe, just maybe, Saiyan genes could afford Vegeta the means to hear me, to maybe even see me, the sprawled out puppet on the other side of a mirror, begging and begging to be let free.

"Vegeta!" I screamed through bloodied vocal cords. "Vegeta see me! See me!"

Yet I was nothing more than a fly tapping on the outside of a window, precisely as Kakarot had planned.

"This is enough," Vegeta said smugly, eyes darting around his surroundings, taking in the vast, expensive scenery. He looked dismally towards the decorations, the small water fall on the other side of the room, the green and silver that had NEVER been my choice of colors. "None of this makes sense."

Kakarot merely gazed at him sheepishly, a false, fake look of innocence and naivety. Oh God but if Vegeta only knew that behind that shy smile lay serpents.

"This universe is strange and the people are……" Vegeta glanced to the side, sorting his words. "terrified."

I just wanted to slap him for being so beautiful, for being the perfect fucking pawn, the perfect victim for Kakarot. If only he hadn't been everything the monster had dreamed about. If only there was some immense, undefeatable flaw that disgusted Kakarot enough to let us both go.

"Terrified?" Kakarot cocked his head to the side, arms laced behind him in a boyish manner, pacing around Vegeta.

"Yes," Vegeta spat. "Terrified. They fear some monster that reigns here, some maniacal creature that haunts this world. They say a soulless alien took over earth and enslaved them all."

"Is that what they said then?" Kakarot grinned, trying to hide his teeth, trying to maintain his pathetic charade.

"Care to explain or would you prefer I beat it out of you?"

Kakarot smiled most at that, running his hands through his hair in a gesture I have never made in my life. In a bold move, he sauntered up to Vegeta, eyes beaming and flirtatious as he paid no mind to personal boundaries. His eyes flashed as his face came within a mere inch of the other's, teeth gleaming beneath his insane smile.

"Suppose I prefer you beat it out of me?" He breathed.

Vegeta's face was too hilarious to throw into words, eyebrows damn near meeting his hair line.

"Is that what you want to do Vegeta," Kakarot whispered, eyelids low. "Do you want to hurt me?"

If Vegeta hadn't been so caught up in keeping his nether regions in check, the thought might have crossed his God damn brain that never in my LIFE have I ever been so bold! In most of our encounters, I was damn near raped into it, unable to even respond to most of his advances until the very last moment when I realized that, between the two of us, I had no chance of resistance.

Vegeta just shook his head, stumbling backwards and putting distance between them. I'd never seen him so caught off guard, so speechless. He'd visibly paled, eyes darting here and there more sporadically as he tried to get his bearings.

"Enough of this," He growled. "it's time to go home."

A look of disappointment crossed Kakarot's features, smile washed instantly away.

"But I am home." He said, crossing his arms and turning his back to the other Saiyan. "This world is precisely how it should be," he turned back with a wicked grin. "evil, human-enslaving aliens and all."

"And what about your family?" Vegeta interjected, eyes hard.

A slight hitch in his breath and Kakarot amazed me one more time. I thought I'd seen every look there was to see on my own face. I thought I could read Kakarot as well as God himself could. Yet he caught me off yet again.

An infinite sadness came into his eyes, his breath caught in his throat. Beautiful, white flesh became the color of a corpse's, so pale it didn't look real. Even the gorgeous purple hint to his red lips drained into ashen, eyes full with a look of despair so intense it made my heart-wrench.

"My…… family?" He said, voice so choked I could hardly hear him.

"Yes," Vegeta hissed out from his teeth, looking positively primal in his anger. "Or did you completely forget about them. The world's deranged hero, thinking of no one but himself."

He spat in disgust.

"Why do you think I could never……." He caught his bottom lip between his teeth, forcefully quieting himself.

"Could never what?" Kakarot turned to look at him, formerly lost in his own revolution about his family.

"Nothing."

"No," Kakarot spoke again, not to be deterred. He walked towards Vegeta, hesitating only when the other Saiyan hatefully turned his back to him. "Tell me what you could never do? Tell me what-…"

"I could never give a shit about you THAT'S what!" Vegeta reeled on him, eyes fiery. "A pathetic excuse for a lame-brained Saiyan that doesn't give a shit enough about his own family to put his own stupidity aside! The world saw YOU as its chosen hero Kakarot, you!"

Vegeta pushed him backwards, Kakarot stumbling from the force and landing on the bed.

"A Saiyan protects his own," Vegeta pointed his finger down to the floor for emphasis. "A Saiyan does not leave his family to the good graces of the universe because of a selfish mistake! A Saiyan does not abandon his own home world because the residence don't see him as a glorified hero anymore!

"Your family could have DIED in your absence, could die any day that you are gone and you tell me THIS is your new home?!"

He shook his head, eyes red-rimmed with madness.

"Fuck you. You have no honor."

Kakarot had sat up on the edge of the bed, mind no doubt reeling with this information.

"And that's why you could never be with me," he spoke in a whisper, eyes staring off at nothing. "because you never respected me."

"Pfft." Vegeta merely answered, back towards the other as he hatefully gazed around at the room. "There were other reasons."

"Because you hated me," Kakarot continued. "because you knew, within yourself, I was no damn hero. A man is only as good as his options and at the first real test of self, I ran."

The other said nothing, listening.

"You knew that even as evil as you portrayed yourself, you would never do what I have done. You knew that despite how much the humans hated you, despite what anyone thought, you'd still protect them. And me, I didn't even think of them. I didn't think a second of them then and I haven't thought even marginally of them since I've been here."

"Well, so glad you could have learned your lesson," Vegeta rolled his eyes. "Now, where are the Dragon Balls, I want to get out of this creepy place."

"Th…. There are none here." Kakarot stuttered, glancing anywhere but Vegeta as he sorted out his lies. "They don't exist."

The other Saiyan wavered in his stance, lips tight as he let that one sink in.

"No…..Dragon Balls?" He said quietly.

An eerie silence came over the room.

"What do you mean no Dragon Balls!!?" He shouted, arms flailing out to the sides. "How are we supposed to get back?!"

"I-I don't know!" Kakarot chewed his lip. "I'll think of something."

"Oh that's a safe bet," Vegeta spat sarcastically. "let's just wait around for that one."

"You know what," Kakarot glared upwards, finally getting to his feet intimidatingly. "You are unpleasant."

Vegeta stepped back, probably never having guessed that his little pet Goku would actually stand up to him without having a life-or-death reason to do so.

"What do you mean 'unpleasant'?" He growled.

"You, Vegeta, are rude." Kakarot said, crossing his arms. "You are a nasty tempered little asshole. I don't know what I expected, but you, my friend, are rude."

"What precisely do you mean by 'what you expected'?"

Kakarot grabbed Vegeta by his collar, hoisting him violently in the air and smashing him into a wall.

"I don't think it matters," The younger Saiyan glared, holding the other painfully against the wall. Vegeta's face was absolutely priceless and if I could have put it on a Christmas Card, I probably would have. "What matters is, I never want you talking to me like that ever again, understand?"

Now precisely where Kakarot was going with all this, I'll never know. Perhaps his ability to intimidate an entire globe of weaker beings had gone to his head. Perhaps ten years of no one looking at him with even a sidewards glance had given him delusions of grandeur. Whatever the case, I can tell you it was quite unexpected when his teeth were damn near knocked into the back of his throat by a blow that would have disintegrated a weaker man.

He flew across the room, head grinding itself into the wall, heavy body landing on the waterfall statues and destroying them. He quickly tugged his head from its captivity, rubble and plaster spraying all over the room. His fantastic gray shirt was drenched with water, the damaged fountain spitting mass amounts of liquid everywhere.

He stood wobbly, grabbing what was left of the wall for support.

"That's right," he grinned satanically. "That's how I like it."

Vegeta was not to be caught off guard, throwing an enormous blast that was barely dodged by the other.

A quick spray of fiery energy launched itself against the Prince's chest, knocking him into the wall behind.

The strangest sensation came over me that they were both positively enjoying this little bout, a sensation that made me even more furious than ever. I was the only one Vegeta had enjoyed fighting like this. Vegeta was the only one that could throw my pulse into overload like that.

It infuriated me.

The two battled it out, finally just throwing themselves forward into an all out punching brawl, fighting for dominance over the other.

"Higher your power," Vegeta ordered. "I KNOW you're stronger than this!"

Kakarot responded by flipping the other Saiyan onto his back, battering teeth and flesh until blood was flying through the air into his face.

Neither was winning but also, neither was necessarily losing either. Having never known each other's fighting style, having never seen the other in action, they constantly became victim's to sneak attacks that would have never been the case in mine and Vegeta's world.

I saw Vegeta's frustration when moves he'd never seen me enact would catch him off guard, a blow to the face that he'd never seen me deliver in the past. Of course, Vegeta also didn't know that Kakarot had never reached the point of Super Saiyan, and as a result, believed the other to simply be toying with him, keeping both of their levels low.

Kakarot on the other hand, was testing Vegeta. In every smile, I saw his tactics, understood why he allowed this to continue. Besides the massive high he received from fighting with another Saiyan that he'd never encountered before, he was curious as to how strong this other being could be; how strong Kakarot HIMSELF could be.

Vegeta pinned him down, hands in each other's hands as they struggled. Kakarot put up a valiant fight from beneath, eyebrows colliding as he ground his teeth, flying upwards until Vegeta's back smashed into the ceiling.

"You….. mother….. fucker…." Vegeta gnashed between his jaws, eyes burning with intensity.

The transformation came quickly after Vegeta finally lost his temper, beautiful black eyes bleeding into cruel turquoise, the pupil disappearing in what I knew was a painful part of the ascension process.

Vegeta's skin and hair paled, angry black tresses burnt into gleaming white. His eyes became even harder, turquoise fading into a near white, blue-silver color that always signaled when his foe had gone too far.

Kakarot, for his part, was speechless, composure gone as he fell silently to the floor, gazing upwards at the ethereal transformation.

"So that's how…." He breathed, chest rising and falling rapidly.

Vegeta watched curiously, never having been so admired for something as trivial as changing was to us. He'd certainly never seen me react so oddly, face going from death-stare to a look that simply screamed 'huh?' in a matter of seconds.

"What's wrong with you?" He demanded.

"You are," Kakarot swallowed. "amazing."

"Heh," Vegeta smiled smugly, closing his eyes. "been a long time since you've seen me in all my glory."

Kakarot took the bait, eyes flooding with lust and deranged sadism.

"Been a long time since a lot of things." He cocked his head to the side, raising an eyebrow.

Vegeta's feet touched the floor, his silvery white hair dancing above him.

"If you catch my drift." Kakarot added.

The other stood there for a moment, a thousand things going through his mind and a thousand things I'd never know. He gazed at the other with a cryptic look, admiring the handsome, strange creature that sat on the floor before him. Maybe somewhere inside himself he knew something was wildly off. Maybe somewhere deeper still, he knew this wasn't the same man that had fallen in love with him so completely it'd nearly destroyed us both. Maybe a lot of things.

Vegeta kneeled, crawling cat-like towards Kakarot, ever cautious despite the millions of things that might have clued him in on the obvious.

I knew better than to thrash, knew better than to scream, knew better than to cry like a desperate mad man. I knew none of the above would help, knew he'd never see or hear me.

The thought crossed my mind that this would be the end of the story; a story never really finished.

The thought crossed my mind that this was the end of it all. That they would accept that there was no way back to the other world; that they would find consolation in each other; that Kakarot would come up with a million and one excuses as to why he was so different from the heart-broken fool that had left their world so long ago.

The thought crossed my mind that maybe they deserved each other, that maybe this WAS the best way to end a story.

As Vegeta threw Kakarot on the bed, devouring the other's lips painfully, I almost accepted that I would soon be nothing more than that odd smell wafting from an unknown room. I would see and I would scream and I would wail as I watched them, until my eyes began to rot out of my head, until my lips cracked and fell from my chin, until my screaming came to an inevitable halt.

And that would be the end of the story. And it would be precisely as Kakarot had planned, as he tore Vegeta's shirt off, soft fingers tracing the skin of a fairytale. He would know I watched, the old ghost behind the mirror, as his lips wound over Vegeta's throat, listening for the hitches in breath when he hit precisely the spot the other Saiyan loved most of all.

He would even stare at me while they did it, as they did it now, every day, Vegeta's beautiful hair fisted in his hand as they fucked each other raw. Black, cruel eyes would stare at me from Vegeta's lap, pulsating cock deep-throated by a man that wasn't me.

And he would know, just as he did then, I would listen to the throaty gasps of a man that was once, within reason, my own, lost to selfishness.

And that would just be the end of the story.


	21. Chapter 21

Voyeurism at its ugliest

Voyeurism at its ugliest.

You know how the story ended, how it became the torturous hell hole I then resided in. Only you know now that's not really how anything ended. Would it have been a pretty, ironic twist of events? Apparently not enough of one.

But my thoughts are chaotic. I write this now, my final chapter, knowing things I'm about to put into words and trying to sort out how to do so. Should I spend a lot of time, twisting my vocabulary to make it flowery and poetic? Or should I just tell you what happened next?

I've never been terrific with words.

Vegeta had finally stood, soaked in Kakarot's sweat, blood and other, buttoning his pants with frustration. At what? No idea. In the small time apart, perhaps in the time spent amongst only humans, I believe that Vegeta had finally developed a hated conscience, brows furrowed as though he was angry at himself.

"What's your hurry?" Kakarot asked with no emotion, eyes planted only on Vegeta's features that were no doubt getting to him as well.

"I'm not wasting another moment on this deranged planet," The other Saiyan mulled in a pissy voice, grouchily pawing at his zipper. "This place gives me the creeps."

"So you're not staying then?"

Unreadable emotions took over the younger man's face, all indecipherable yet undeniably negative.

"Staying?" Vegeta turned on him, teeth apparently glued together as he ground them. "Staying?"

He spat on the floor again, frustration overwhelming any civility that might at some point have manifest itself.

"Staying where? Staying WHERE Kakarot?" He grabbed the other by the back of the throat, pulling him closer. "It's like this place has taken you totally out of reality! This place isn't even REAL! This is some pathetic clone of our world, twisted and created by some self-centered psycho's temper tantrum!"

He pushed Kakarot away violently.

"Get a hold of yourself for God's sake." He spat. "Of all the things that don't seem right in this place, you're the one that stands out the most!"

"So I make you uncomfortable?" Kakarot stood with the smooth, grace of a snake. "What is it then? Is it my face?" He touched his cheek. "Do I not make his facial expressions well enough for you?"

"What?"

But Kakarot ignored Vegeta entirely, feeding off the look of almost amusing confusion on the other's face.

"Or is it my voice," The taller Saiyan continued, watching as the other started to walk backwards from his approach. "Do I not speak so softly, so infuriatingly pure and PERFECT!"

His anger came out in a wave, catching both me and Vegeta off guard. So smoothly he had hid it, covered by a face of complete nihilism. Now it manifested itself in full swing, like a surprise punch to the face.

A chair was flung across the already destroyed room, battering itself against the wall before falling down amongst the rest of the ruckus.

"Or is it my arms," The infuriated man hissed, spitting between his teeth as he torn the remainder of his shirt from his arms, revealing the damage he'd inflicted upon himself.

A quick intake of breath came from Vegeta, a hitch in his breathing as he beheld the bruise-like trackmarks. His eyes went over the suffering, red veins, the open sores slowly scabbing over pale flesh. It was almost as though he saw the redness, the ashen color around Kakarot's eyes for the first time, backing up even further as the revelation overcame him.

"Who…." He swallowed. "just who are you?"

Ignoring him once more, Kakarot closed their distance, grabbing Vegeta and spinning him towards the bed, both of them facing me!

"I have a secret for you fair Prince," The monster whispered childishly into the other's ear. "Shhh, don't tell."

Revealing a small control device from his shredded pant leg, Kakarot revealed me.

And oh, what a moment it was.

A small beep came from the tiny, black piece of plastic, the younger Saiyan's eyes dancing as he held a quivering finger over the button. Slowly the glass concealing me began to part, fresh air not dank and humid with the scent of blood flowing into my face.

I wondered narcissistically what I looked like, watching as Vegeta in slow motion paled, a sick look coming over his face and a gag-like sound wrenching from his guts into his mouth. I wanted to puke just looking at him wanting to puke.

And inevitably it came, hot and sour, draining all across the floor. Vegeta's whole body heaved, rendering him on all fours as he emptied his stomach.

Was I really that bad I wondered, caught in my own sick sense of humor. Did I resemble Bulma now, half human, half something entirely otherwise? Was I a monster, black and blue and bloody, covered in gangrene, filth and feces?

Gorgeous.

And although I cried out quickly, the sound was undoubtedly covered by the loud crack of a gun going off, not once, but twice. The bullets, spurned on by alien energy, split through Vegeta's unprotected skin, blasting through the back of his knees and demolishing the bones.

I knew this attack all too well, knowing how the force of the pain could render you absolutely unable to even scream. Vegeta's face was a priceless replica of what mine must have been, all color instantly draining from his flesh.

Black eyes stretched to their limits, red lips twitched and breath came in gasps as he tried to cry, tried to scream from the agony of his knees being blown out. Aw, but if only he'd kept his guard up rather than sleep with the enemy. Tsk tsk. His power now was merely that of a strong human, Kakarot's plan executing itself perfectly.

We were both at his mercy now, all hope (and you can imagine what a surprise there was that there was any to be lost at all) was gone now, my stomach dropping with the same speed that Vegeta's head dropped to the floor.

With true movie-style, Kakarot blew the smoke from each of his guns, a wicked grin stretching across his face.

"All the power of the universe," He laughed, spinning them in his hands. "and both you idiots are at the mercy of a human weapon."

He walked up to me languidly, doused in the pleasure of this moment.

"Betcha wondered why I kept these around," He slapped me hard across the face with a barrel. "Betcha never really knew Saiyan power could fall so short."

He turned his back to me, walking over Vegeta's unconscious body carelessly.

"But you see Goku," He chuckled deep in his chest. "Power….. is a gift. Not a privilege, not something you just receive freely. It comes with costs and with weaknesses."

He turned his gorgeous face to me, winking sweetly.

"Guess you both realize that now, Kings of the Universe."

Chapter continued…………..


End file.
